“I am not a musicologist!”
Some Considerations about Dille’s Bartók Research
Carl Van Eyndhoven (KU Leuven)
Denijs Dille (1904 - 2005) is widely recognized as the leading pioneer in Bartók
research. Jürgen Hunkemöller calls him ‘[der] primus movens de internationalen BartókForschung’1 ([the] primus movens of international Bartók research) and Malcolm Gillies
describes him as ‘the Hercule Poirot or Bartókiana’2. They confirm the image of Dille as
a passionate researcher who, as a true pioneer, seeks out, explores, and makes
accessible to the researchers that come after him new approaches to the work of Bartók.
These statements date from the early nineties of the last century, twenty years after Dille
retired as director of the Bartók Archívum in Budapest. Yet his reputation as Bartók
researcher goes back much farther. A report of the ‘II. Ungarische
Musikwissenschaftliche Konferenz’, for example, which took place in 1961, the year in
which Dille officially started as director of the Bartók Archívum, states:
Ein Mittelpunkt der Konferenz war wohl Denijs Dille, der berühmte Bartók-Forscher, der aus
Antwerpen erst unlängst nach Budapest übersiedelte. Ausser seinem zusammenfassenden
Referat und seiner Eröffnungsrede leistete er auch durch die Leitung der BartókGedenkausstellung im Bartók-Archiv eine unermüdliche Mitarbeit um die Konferenz erfolgreich zu
gestalten
[A highlight in the conference was Denijs Dille, the famous Bartók researcher who recently moved
from Antwerp to Budapest. Aside from his summary presentation and his opening speech, he also
made a significant contribution, through the realisation of the Bartók retrospective exhibition in the
Bartók Archives, to making the conference a success.] 3
On his seventieth birthday in 1974, a brief notice was published in the Hungarian
newspaper Népszabadság:
Denijs Dille à Szentendre aux Archives Béla Bartók: «…son livre sur Bartók, en langue flamande
et publié en 1939, a été une initiative sans exemple. (…) C’est lui qui a mis au point pendant dix
ans le matériel des archives Bartók peut-être avec une rigueur exagérée, mais en même temps
avec une précision scientifique extraodinaire».
[Denijs Dille at the Béla Bartók Archives in Szentendre: ‘... his book on Bartók, in Flemish and
published in 1939, was an unprecedented initiative. (...) It was he who, during a period of ten
years, elaborated the material of the Bartók archives, perhaps with excessive rigour, yet at the
same time with extraordinary scientific precision.’]
1
Jürgen Hunkemöller over Regard in Die Musikforschung, 46(1993)4: 448.
Review door Malolm Gillies over Regard in Music & Letters, 73(1992)3: 472.
3 II. Ungarische Musikwissenschaftliche Konferenz zu Ehren des 150. Jahrtages der Geburt von Franz
Liszt und des 80. Jahrestage der Geburt von Béla Bartók. Budpaest, 25-30 September 1961, in: Studia
Musicologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, T.2, Fasc. ¼ (1962), p. 346
2
1
This brief notice contains a number of interesting points:
(1) It refers to the biography Dille published in 1939 ‘with the consent of Bartók’ (dixit
Dille). This publication includes the first list of Bartók's compositions; a list that was
created in consultation between Dille and Bartók. The correspondence pertaining to this
subject is kept in the Bartók Archives, housed in the Royal Library.
(2) The book is written ‘en langue flamande’, in other words in Dutch. The biography
Dille published in 1974 (Béla Bartók), followed in 1979 by a book on Bartók's works (Het
werk van Béla Bartók [The Work of Béla Bartók]), is published in Dutch. The importance
of these works in the context of the international Bartók research has consequently
remained very limited.
(3) The notice also refers to his extensive work at the Bartók Archívum, with the subtly
critical addition ‘peut-être avec une rigeur exagérée’ (perhaps with excessive rigour).
This is certainly one of Dille’s distinguishing characteristics.
(4) At the same time, the text refers to his exceptional scientific precision which rightly
qualifies him as a particularly conscientious researcher.
It is this ‘rigorous researcher’, Denijs Dille, who has repeatedly stated ‘I am not a
musicologist!’ An intriguing statement from someone who is listed in Oxford Music
Online as ‘Dille, Denijs (b.Aerschot, 21 Feb. 1904) - Belgian musicologist’. Note, also,
that according to Oxford Music Online Dille is still not deceased.
Dille’s training
Dille studied theology and philosophy at the Minor Seminary in Mechelen. Self-taught,
he studied music and took, to this end, private lessons with prominent musicians. He
studied counterpoint and fugue with Gust Persoons (1905 -1971) ‘in the fashion of
Mortelmans’, which meant, according to Dille, ‘strict counterpoint by the rules’. 4 He
studied harmony with Herman Meulemans (1893 -1965), the brother of composer Arthur
Meulemans. Herman Meulemans also introduced him to modern music, and Dille would
later become one of the most ardent advocates of composers like Schoenberg,
Stravinsky, Hindemith and Bartók in Flanders. The same Herman Meulemans also
impressed upon him at a young age the necessity of ‘know[ing] the art of tone as well
as a composer, because one can otherwise not judge it justly’. Dille studied
orchestration with Daniel Sternefeld (1905-1986), a craft he had mastered exceptionally
4
Lodewijk Mortelmans (1868 - 1952), Vlaams musicus, muziekpedagoog, dirigent en organist.
2
well. It enabled him to make well-founded statements about Bartók's orchestrations. It
also incited him to orchestrate nine compositions by Bartók, including Öt dal (op.16)
Five Songs, from which I will play the third song, Az agyam hivogat [My bed beckons].
It is a recording by the Flemish Radio Orchestra and mezzo-soprano Lucienne van
Deyck.
Aside from music, Dille also studied Roman philology (historical grammar and phonetics,
aesthetics, literary history) with the famous Belgian Romanist Robert Guiette (1895 1976). This made him an eminent scholar of French literature, in particular of Old-French
literature, which he studied according to the meticulous methods of philology.
Dille: interest in Bartók and research
In 1922, Herman Meulemans plays some of Béla Bartók’s Bagatellen (1908). It was
Dille's first contact with the music of Bartók, whose music he will, from 1936 onward,
become intensely involved with. He meets Bartók for the first time in Brussels in
February 1937 and several times thereafter over the course of 1938. Dille writes about
these encounters in 1990 in Regard sur le passé:
Evidemment, je le comprenais mal comme tous ceux qui n’entendaient pas la musique populaire
dans le sens qu’elle avait pour lui. Lors de ses passages en Belgique, j’ai eu plusieurs
conversations avec lui où il n’était question que de technique musicale ou de musique populaire,
et peu des événements de sa vie: il s’y refusait sous prétexte qu’il était encore trop tôt pour en
parler. Mais certaines données ne pouvaient m’échapper.
[Obviously, I had trouble understanding him, just like those who did not understand popular music
in the way he did. During his visits to Belgium, I had several conversations with him where we only
addressed musical technique or popular music, and hardly the events of his life: he refused under
the pretext that it was still too early to talk about them. Yet some facts could not escape my
attention.] 5
In the last sentence we catch a clear glimpse of Dille as ‘Hercule Poirot’ ...
We know of Dille’s first encounter with Bartók in 1937 through the famous interview that
was published in the first volume of the Brussels music magazine La Sirène under the
title Béla Bartók. 6 At the start of the interview, Dille refers to Bartók's ‘conception
nationaliste du rythme et de la mélodie’ [nationalist conception of rhythm and melody].
Dille, rereading the article in 1987, fifty years after the interview, is surprised by the
patience Bartók had with him: ‘Car parler de « nationaliste » (…) c’était réellement
manifester une ignorance de ses travaux et une incompréhension de la nature de ses
5
Denijs Dille, Béla Bartok. Regard sur le passé, Yves Lenoir (ed.), Namen, Presses Universitaires de
Namur, 1990, p. 16.
6 Interview door Denijs Dille op 2 februari 1937; « Béla Bartók» in La Sirène, 1(1937)1, p. 3-6.
3
compositions’ [For talking of ‘nationalist’ (...) was actually displaying an ignorance of his work and a
failure to understand the nature of his compositions]. 7
This does, however, not prevent Dille to ask the 'right' questions in this interview;
questions that demonstrate his understanding of certain aspects of Bartók's
compositional technique, such as the relationship between melody and rhythm on the
one hand and harmony on the other. The slight reservation Bartók expressed with
regard to the work of Edwin von der Nüll - ‘il s’agit là d’une étude systématique et
scientifique qui veut être aussi complète que possible’ [this is a systematic and scientific study
that aims to be as complete as possible] - is reflected in Dille’s distrust of all-explaining
systems.8 It is the distrust of the philologist focusing on the detail, at the risk of getting
entirely lost. Bartók's reference to aspects of intuition, instinct and feeling that guide him
when composing, touches on Dille's lifelong fascination with ‘genius'. Dille explicitly
states the question of the origin of genius at the beginning of Het werk van Béla Bartók
(1979). Dille also raises questions on the problem of the relationship between folk music
and art music. He fully understands that real knowledge of folk music is essential to the
understanding of Bartók's music and gaining insight into what Dille calls ‘l'invention
créatrice’ [creative invention]. In 1938, Dille again – and insistently – asks Bartók
whether he can explain the presence and influence of folk music in his String Quartets.
In the preface to Folklore et transcendance dans l’oeuvre américaine de Béla Bartók
(1940-1945) – a publication of the late Yves Lenoir from 1986 – he recounts Bartók's
answer: ‘Impossible; pour comprendre il faudrait connaître la musique populaire que j’ai
connue, et cela non pas par les livres, même par les miens, mais par de bons
enregistrements, et surtout en faisant sa connaissance sur place.’ [Impossible; to understand
this one should know the popular music I have known, and this not through books, not even mine, but
through good recordings, and especially by getting to know it on site]. 9
During his talks with Bartók
(in 1937 and 1938), personal events from his life are rarely discussed. In 1964, Dille
looks back at his memories of these conversations with a critical eye:
Tout cela forme une moisson de souvenirs, non pas tellement grande, mais dont chaque détail
m’est précieux. Pourtant, j’estime que ces données constituent seulement une série d’anecdotes;
et comme, même sans le vouloir, on transforme fatalement ses souvenirs en les revivant, qu’on
les remodèle d’après une image formée a posteriori, je m’abstiens d’ordinaire d’en parler.10
All this makes for a harvest of memories, not all that great, but every detail is precious to me.
However, I believe that these facts constitute only a series of anecdotes; and as one, even
unintentionally, inevitably transforms one’s memories by reliving them, reshapes them on the
basis of an image formed in hindsight, I usually refrain from talking about them.
7
Denijs Dille, Regard sur le passé, p. 381.
Regard sur le passé, p.27.
9 Folklore et transcendance, p. 5.
10 Denijs Dille, Regard, p. 313. Zie ook: idem, p. 385.
8
4
When Dille comes into contact with Zoltán Kodály in 1946, the latter impresses upon him
the necessity to visit Hungary. On this subject, Dille remarks: ‘il m’a répété souvent
l’adage de Goethe « ins Land des Dichters gehn ». L’information que je lui dois à partir
de ma première visite en 1949 a été immense, parce que c’était une véritable initiation
au fait ‘Bartók’, de même qu’à l’esprit et au caractère hongrois.’ 11
[he] has often repeated Goethe’s saying ‘ins Land des Dichters gehn’ (go to the land of the poet). The
information I gathered, thanks to him, from my first visit in 1949 was huge because that was a real
initiation to the subject of ‘Bartók', as well as to the Hungarian spirit and character.
From then on, his research activities will rapidly intensify. He comes into contact with
Béla Bartók Jr., Elza Bartók, Márta Ziegler, Ditta Pásztory, Ilonka Bartók, Stefi Geyer,
and others. Between 1950 and October 1954 he was denied access to Hungary, but in
the period from 1955 to 1960, he undertook many trips: ‘Le temps pressait: les vieilles
personnes mouraient et le pays évoluait; ce que j’avais vu en 1949, ne se voyait plus en
1959, on peut m’en croire. Mais la Hongrie garde malgré tout une fidélité à son
caractère, à sa nature propres; c’est pour cela que je l’aime et que j’y suis resté.’12 Time
was short: old people died and the country was changing; what I had seen in 1949, was no longer there in
1959, believe me. Yet Hungary has stayed true to its character, to its own nature; this is why I love it and
why I stayed.
From 1968 onward, he will literally follow in the footsteps of Bartók and travel through
Maramures and Transylvania, Bihor, Sînnicolaul Mare (Nagyszentmiklós), Romanian
Banat, Yugoslav Banat, Slovakia (Bratislava) ... The maps in which he records these
trips are also preserved in the Bartók archive of the Royal Library.
The common thread through all these activities is Dille’s intent to collect as many facts
as possible on the life of Bartók. To this end, Dille goes on site to record testimonials
from people who have known Bartók. It is a long and intense investigation carried out in
preparation of his actual research.
Dille's work as a scientific researcher was largely conducted between 1961 and 1971
when he held the position of director at the Bartók Archívum in Budapest. The majority
of his research articles appear during this period, including in the series Documenta
Bartókiana whose first four volumes were published by Dille between 1964 and 1970.
He also publishes some of Bartók's early works, including the Sonata for violin and
piano (1903) [Szonáta zongorára és hegedure].
In his research, Dille discerned two fundamental problems:
11
12
Idem, p. 16.
Idem, p. 19.
5
(1) the problem of biography and the relationship between life and work
(2) the problem of folk music and the relationship between folk music and art music
Dille and the problem of biography
Dille has repeatedly touched upon the problem of biography throughout his lectures and
articles. The posthumously published study ‘Béla Bartók en het probleem van de
biografie’ [Béla Bartók and the problem of biography] (1968) contains his key ideas on
this issue. With respect to the subject of biography, he vehemently opposes any form of
hagiography and the uncritical approach to sources. He identifies two problem areas: (1)
the material, in which the verifiability of facts and the perspective of the observer play an
important role, and (2) the method of presentation of these facts, including the problem
of the relationship between the life and work of the composer. Dille himself concludes
that a biography must in any case meet historical standards and must therefore, de
facto, be based on factual knowledge. His statement ‘I am not a musicologist. I am a
philologist’ must be understood in this sense. He clarifies this statement in an interview
on the occasion of his 90th birthday. According to him, musicologists mainly and
primarily base their biographies on assumptions (Dille speaks of hypotheses), not on
accurately verified facts. In his article, he discusses for instance the problematic manner
in which some researchers approach the letters of Bartók. He writes:
Not only does the correspondence of Bartók and his family, as we now know it, give a very
incomplete picture of his life and thinking, but that which one gets to see also manifests a
pronounced evolution; it would be very unusual for a slowly yet consistently developing person to
write letters in 1944 that testify to the same ideology as the one held in 1900. It should also be
taken into account – yet nobody did – that Bartók, at best, is a mediocre writer who rarely
manages to accurately express his thoughts; and also that it is necessary to understand his letters
in function of the person whom he addresses. The fact that he sometimes 'literizes', i.e. is biased,
so that his expression goes beyond what he actually thinks; that what he believes is not always
personal, not very clear, not so special; that, apart from a few (...) exceptions, the value of his
correspondence mainly lies in the chronology of his work and activities, no biographer seems to
have noticed. 13
His aversion to any form of non-fact-based Bartók-biography, is also articulated in
‘Quelques remarques biographiques’ of 1984:
Il est évident qu’il faudra orienter les recherches vers des domaines complémentaires tels que les
problèmes de l’hérédité et de l’ascendance, et en général vers tout ce qui concerne la jeunesse:
c’est un période dont on a sous-estimé l’importance. La biographie de Bartók a suivi jusqu’à
13
Denijs Dille, « Béla Bartók en het probleem van de biografie », Revue belge de musicologie/Belgisch
tijdschrift voor muziekwetenschap, 58(2004): 225-231, p. 227-228.
6
présent une espèce de schéma qu’on pourrait appeler officiel, un schéma qui incline
dangereusement vers la légende, pour ne pas dire l’hagiographie.14
It is evident that the research must be directed toward complementary fields such as the
problems of heredity and ancestry, and generally everything related to the youth: it is a period
whose importance is underestimated. Bartók's biography has hitherto followed a kind of scheme
that might be called official, a scheme that tilts dangerously towards legend, if not hagiography.
It is particularly Dille's research into the youth and the childhood works of Bartók that is
of inestimable importance.
Dille, in the first place, aimed to gain an overview of the personality of Bartók from a
triple perspective: historical, scientific and aesthetic.
(…) seulement après il nous sera possible de faire une synthèse valable et approchant de la
réalité psychologique autant de de la réalité historique. Il est évident que la définition de la matière
nous définit en même temps le but précis des recherches, et que les exigences de cette matière
nous prescrivent les disciplines scientifiques et philologiques les plus rigoureuses. 15
(…) only later will we be able to make a sound and accurate synthesis of the psychological reality
as well as of the historical reality. It is obvious that the definition of the subject similarly defines the
specific purpose of the research, and that the requirements of this matter dictate the most rigorous
scientific and philological discipline.
Yet he is conscious of the fact that neither a collection of documents nor a sequence of
facts constitute a biography:
Les documents ne sont que de lave figée; comment la faire rentrer à l’état d’incandescence, voilà
le secret de la vraie biographie. 16
Documents are only solidified lava; to return it to the state of incandescence, is the secret of true
biography.]
In his unpublished memories Dille looks back on his own biographical research:
Ik heb aangevangen op te schrijven in 1949 gedurende mijn eerste reis naar Hongarije. In mijn
gedachten waren dat nota’s voor een biografie die ik me voorgenomen had te schrijven; weldra
zag ik in dat het alleen materiaal ter onderzoeking was of sporen die andere vorsers konden
nagaan. In feit wilde ik de waarachtigheid nagaan van wat verteld werd en in omloop was, want ik
ben wantrouwig en houd van feiten; ik heb meer en meer ondervonden dat het absoluut nodig
was, dat heel de biografie op losse schroeven stond, dat het gescherm en gezwets met brieven
14
Denijs Dille, «Quelques remarques biographiques» in Regard sur le passé, p. 279.Initieel gepubliceerd
in Béla Bartók vivant, Bibliothèque finno-ougrienne,2, Paris, Publications Orientalistes de France, 1984,
p. 67-75.
15 Denijs Dille, «Les problèmes des recherches sur Bartók», Studia Musicologica 5(1963): 419.
16 Idem, p. 421.
7
de laagste journalistiek benaderde en dat al de informatie die van “vrienden” kwam of van
“medewerkers” eenvoudig tot het domein van de verzinsels behoorde. 17
I started to write in 1949 during my first trip to Hungary. In my mind, these were notes for a
biography I had planned to write; I soon realized that it was only investigative material or traces
that other researchers could explore. In fact I wanted to check the veracity of what was told and
circulating because I am suspicious and love facts; I have increasingly found that this was
absolutely necessary, that the whole biography was unreliable, that all the rambling and the
grandstanding with letters approached the lowest level of journalism and that all the information
from ‘friends’ or ‘employees’ simply belonged to the realm of fiction.
The biography Dille intends to write is only published in 1974. In the seventies, three
other books, all resulting from Dille's restless quest for facts, are published. Following is
an overview of Dille's book publications between 1939 and 1990, all of which are
situated within the domain of biography:
-
Béla Bartók, 1939
Béla Bartók, 1947 (programme brochure)
-
Béla Bartók , 1974
Thematisches Verzeichnis der Jugendwerke Béla Bartóks 1890-1904, 1974
Généalogie sommaire de la famille Bartók, 197718
Het werk van Béla Bartók, Antwerp, 1979
-
Regard sur le passé, 1990
Dille's Bartók biography from 1939 is especially important because of the ‘list of works’
he includes at the end. This not only includes a list of compositions written by Bartók
between 1902 and December 1938, but also an overview of his transcriptions for piano,
annotated editions, books, articles, ... The opus list was compiled by Dille and corrected
by Bartók, the other lists were, as Dille indicates, ‘made by the composer’. He thinks it
fair to say: ‘We may consider this catalogue complete up until early December 1938’.
But being Dille, he is quick to add: ‘However, since this is the first time that a
bibliography was compiled, something or other may have escaped our notice; however,
we hope not.’19 This book was published in the series Verhandelingen van de Katholieke
Vlaamsche Hoogeschooluitbreiding (year 38, No. 1-2); a series that published ten
treatises every year, obviously in Dutch. Its impact will consequently have been rather
limited. Yet every page in this treatise testifies of Dille's keen insight, critical spirit and
Denijs Dille, voorwoord bij zijn Memoires over Bartók, niet gepubliceerd, Bartók Archief, p. 1/V.
Dit werk kwam tot stand op basis van Dille’s bezoek, drie weken lang, in 1952 aan Ilonka Bartók in
Noorwegen, cf. Regard sur le passé, p 17.
19 Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, 1939, p. 97.
17
18
8
aesthetic sense. The purely biographical part is largely limited to Bartók's autobiography
from 1921, along with a number of personal remarks. Dille subsequently highlights a
number of facets in short sections with titles such as The Thinker, The Expressionist,
The Folk Song, Debussy, Beethoven, Bach, The Rhythm, The Keyboard Music and the
Quartets ... The pages Dille dedicates to Expressionism and Impressionism, which he
sees as ‘operative systems within the aesthetic romanticism’, alone should be translated
into English. Dille also adds a number of ‘analyses’, including one on the 1st String
Quartet, to which he dedicates a whopping twelve pages. These are general, descriptive
form analyses that might seem somewhat prosaic in the light of contemporary
musicological analysis. They nonetheless again confirm his keen understanding of
Bartók's music. Generally it can be concluded that Dille hardly touched upon the purely
technical analysis of Bartók's works. He does, however, express an aesthetic opinion on
the latter’s oeuvre. The true research focus of Dille’s Bartók-research has always been
‘the man Bartók’ with his ‘exceptional qualities and weaknesses inherent to the human
condition’. 20 Especially with regard to his youth and childhood works, Dille remains the
reference source of choice for researchers. The Thematisches Verzeichnis seems to be
the most important contribution Dille has made to the Bartók research. Tibor Tallian
summarizes its importance:
Dieser Reichtum an gesammeltem biografischen Stoff verleiht dem Buch Dilles eine Bedeutung,
die bei weitem die eines Werkverzeichnisses überschreitet. Die ersten Lebensjahre Bartóks
werden hier wohl das erste Mal umfassend ergründet, freundschaftliche und familiäre
Beziehungen und vor allem die ersten Schritte, die Bartók in die musikalische
Kompositionstechnik einführten, grundsätzlich geklärt.21
This wealth of collected biographical material gives Dille’s book a significance that far exceeds
that of a catalogue raisonné. Bartók's first years of life are here, probably for the first time,
comprehensively explored, relations with friends and family and in particular Bartók's first steps in
the musical composition technique, are fundamentally analysed.
Dille will not publish the biography he has been planning since 1949 until 1974. On the
subject of this biography he writes in Regard sur le passé:
Je me suis contenté d’un enchaînement des événements essentiels de l’existence du musicien en
fonction des oeuvres et de leur évolution me limitant à signaler leurs particularités sans insister et
en évitant les analyses habituelles. Ainsi j’ai probablement suivi, sans le vouloir, la méthode de
József Ujfalussy qui fait ressortir l’unité entre la vie et l’oeuvre en un récit qui s’inspire d’un point
20
Dixit Yves Lenoir in Regard, p. 8. «Il laisse par ailleurs transparaître en filigrane un portrait sans
complaisance du musicien dans lequel les qualités exceptionnelles de l’homme sont certes soulignées,
mais où les failblesses inhérentes à la condition humaine ne sont pas occultées.»
21 Tibor Tallián, «Denijs Dille: Thematisches Verzeichnis der Jugendwerke Béla Bartóks 1890-1904», in
Studia Musicologica 17(1975), p. 434.
9
de vue hongrois actuel le résultat est cependant assez différent parce que je présente la vie
d’une autre façon.22
I have contented myself with a series of key events in the life of the musician in function of the
works and their evolution, while limiting myself to reporting their peculiarities without dwelling too
much on the matter and avoiding the usual analyses. In this way I have probably unwittingly
followed József Ujfalussy’s method [which brings to the fore the unity between life and work in a
text that is based on a contemporary Hungarian point of view], yet the result is quite different
because I present life in a different way
In the ’Justification and points of view’ to this biography, Dille clearly situates the context
of his publication:
It is my sole intention, after so many years of familiarity with Bartók's work and endeavours, to
draw up a balance, which is not intended for musicians, but for listeners who are interested in
Bartók, who want to know something about the man he was and want to orient themselves in his
music.23
In the preface to Het werk van Béla Bartók, published in 1979, he justifies why the works
of Bartók were not or hardly discussed in the 1974 publication: ‘The size of a book which
is aimed at the ordinary reader or lover of music did not allow any more space for
reflections on the work or particular statements than a mere general situation.’24 It was,
according to Dille, in the wake of his series of broadcasts made for BRT 3 [the Flemish
classical radio station] in which he elucidated (in no less than 45 broadcasts) the
complete oeuvre of Bartók, that requests for the publishing of the explanatory texts that
accompanied these broadcasts were made. Dille reworked these texts to fit the format of
a book. The two publications are thus not intended for professional musicians, but for
listeners. The division between life and work is a result of this context, but does certainly
not reflect Dille's vision on the relationship between them.
The problem of biography: the relationship between life and work
Dille was convinced that the life of a composer (writer, artist) cannot be disconnected
from his work, but also, that there are profound differences between both:
Let us however remain on our guard: even if the work originates in the life, it does not follow that
the work is a representation of the life. Both form a nexus in which, despite certain connections,
profound differences must not be lost sight of. (...) Even if the work takes place in this life, feeds
on the blood and marrow of this life, it does not recount, much less clarifies, this life. Because the
work is on the other side, i.e. it occurs at the level of the life of imagination which, although
influenced and fertilized by daily life, also disengages the work from the passing contingency and
the all-too-easy explanation of everyday banality. 25
22
Denijs Dille, Regard sur le passé, p. 16.
Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, Antwerpen, 1974, p. 7.
24 Denijs Dille, Het werk van Béla Bartók, Antwerpen, 1979, p. 5.
25 Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, 1974, p. 33.
23
10
In Regard sur le passé (1990) he reiterates this same idea:
Je sais que d’aucuns accordent peu d’importance aux données biographiques, même s’en
passent volontiers, vu que l’oeuvre vit par elle-même et se suffit à elle-même. Je ne puis le nier,
surtout que la création se situe au niveau de l’imagination, même si elle se nourrit d’incidents
biographiques ou autobiographiques.» 26
I know that some pay little attention to biographical data, even happily do without, since the work
exists in itself and is sufficient in itself. I cannot deny it, especially since creation exists at the level
of imagination, even if it feeds on biographical or autobiographical incidents.]
As mentioned before, Dille was fascinated by genius and the genius can emerge from
the banality of everyday life. He is therefore convinced that the essence of the man
Bartók can ultimately only be found in his work. Already in 1939 he writes: ‘we must
seek Bartók in his work, and there alone.’ 27 In 1964 he puts it even more succinctly: ‘Il
n'y a que son oeuvre qui a pour celui qui sait parlé écouter et comprendre.’ 28 [It is only his
work that has spoken for those who know how to listen and understand.] This is precisely what
Denijs Dille his tried to do his entire life.
The problem of folk music
The significance of folk music for Bartók as a man and as a composer, can, according to
Dille, not be overestimated. Already in his biography of 1939, he writes: ‘Finally, the
significance of folk music for Bartók can never be overestimated: it revealed, gave him
his personality, educated and protected him.’ 29
Dille was utterly fascinated by what he describes as ‘the fusion of the vibrant primitive
forces of folk music and the cerebral technique of modern art music.’ A fusion that is
realised by Bartók in a universal manner, thanks to his genius and his efforts and work:
Il ne s’agissait pas d’intégrer des données de la musique populaire dans sa technique moderne,
ou, si l’on veut, mettre cette dernière au service de ces données pour les faire valoir; non, la
question était de retrouver dans la musique populaire les sources vives et primitives que l’instinct
musical avait découvertes à un moment donné de l’histoire et dont l’art populaire avait fixé et
gardé les formes et les résultats. Intégrer ces forces vives primitives à la technique cérébrale de
l’art musical moderne, c’est entreprendre la fusion des irréductibles. D’autres, tels que Falla,
26
Denijs Dille, Regard sur le passé, p. 20.
Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, 1939, p. 16.
28 Denijs Dille, Regard sur le passé, p. 315.
29 Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, 1939, p. 47.
27
11
Janácek, Kodály et Szymanowski y ont réussi partiellement en se cantonnant dans un idiome
national; il n’y eut que Bartók pour résoudre le problème de façon universelle, et cela autant par
son génie que par ses efforts et son travail.30
It was not a matter of integrating elements of popular music into his modern technique, or, if you
like, of putting the latter at the service of these elements so as to make them relevant; no, the
question was to find in popular music the lively and primitive sources which the musical instinct
had discovered at some point in history and whose forms and results folk art had preserved and
fixed. To integrate these primitive forces with the cerebral technique of modern musical art is to
undertake the fusion of irreducibles. Others, such as Falla, Janacek, Szymanowski and Kodály
have partially succeeded by confining themselves to a national language; only Bartók solved the
problem in a universal manner, and that both through his genius and his efforts and work.
It has preoccupied Dille, as a researcher, his whole life; he remained convinced that
understanding this fusion could not be achieved through in-depth structural analyses.
The solution, for him, was to be found in the genius of Bartók and he concludes, with
respect to the origin of this genius, ‘[that] there is nothing left but to simply accept the
case.‘ 31
Structural analysis
As a researcher, Dille has hardly dealt with the formal problems in Bartók's compositions
which, according to him, only explain the 'how', but not the ‘why’:
Depuis que la musicologie s’occupe de Bartók, (…) l’attention s’est surtout portée sur les
problèmes formels de ses compositions; (…) Mais s’ils nous expliquent le «comment», ils
n’ouvrent guère des perspectives sur le «pourquoi» de la matière. 32
Ever since musicology has been dealing with Bartók, (...) the attention has been mainly focused
on the formal problems in his compositions; (...) But if these tell us of the ‘how’, they hardly open
any perspectives on the ‘why’ of the matter.
Specifically, the ‘how’ in Dille's books is limited to a general, descriptive formal analysis.
This may, as previously stated, serve as a guide for an engaged listener.
Dille, moreover, is very critical of researchers who analyse the complete works of Bartók
according an overall system. In this way, he strongly opposed the classification of
chords according to the Fibonacci numbers, convinced as he is that the golden ratio in
music can only manifest itself through proportions in a linear time lapse. Dille did
basically not believe that structure analyses could contribute to the work of art as such
Denijs Dille, « L’exécution de la musique de Bartók », in Regard sur le passé, p. 356.
Denijs Dille, «Het werk van Béla Bartók», p. 9.
32 Yves Lenoir, Folklore et transcendance dans l’oeuvre Américaine de Béla Bartók (1940-1945), p. 5
30
31
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(composition), or the understanding of it. In the preface to Het werk van Béla Bartók
(1979) he writes:
One more word on the issue of 'analysis'. (...) In the following pages, I (...) briefly use formal
analysis to make the listener more aware and steer him through the structure of a work. It will
always be limited to a minimum. The structural analysis of themes, etc. I leave untouched; it is
interesting in a course on composition, in other words work for specialists, which amounts to the
pleasure or the skill of taking a watch apart and putting it back together. Whether this has anything
to do with the art or the understanding, I leave to others to decide.33
In his Bartók-biography of 1974, he justifies the lack of technical analyses by pointing
out the fact that there is hardly any knowledge on the relationship between folk music
and Bartók’s compositions. An analysis of his work is therefore not possible:
Daarom sluit ik principieel alle technische werkanalyses uit, omdat de gewone luisteraar die toch
niet leest - de musici meestal evenmin - en vooral omdat onze kennis van de verhouding tussen
Bartóks wetenschappelijk werk en zijn kompositie uiterst gebrekkig, eigenlijk niet bestaande is: die
verhouding (met andere woorden: de buitengewone rol die de volksmuziek in Bartóks kompositie
heeft gespeeld) werd tot nu toe op zo onvoldoende wijze en zo oppervlakkig bestudeerd dat we
nog zeer ver van een mogelijkheid staan de werkelijke natuur, het eigen karakter van dit werk te
analyseren en te omschrijven.34
I therefore principally omit all the technical work analyses, because the ordinary listener does not
read them anyway - nor do the musicians - and mainly because our knowledge of the relationship
between Bartók's scientific work and his composition is extremely deficient, actually non-existing:
this relationship (in other words, the extraordinary role folk music has played in Bartók’s
composition) has until now been studied in such an insufficient and superficial manner that we are
still very far removed from the possibility of analysing and defining the true nature, the specific
character of this work.
In conclusion, some considerations
In conclusion, I would like to add some considerations, without, however, wanting to
draw any definitive conclusions.
Denijs Dille is the pioneer in Bartók research. He has, like no other before him, collected
material upon which many later generations of researchers have worked. His
contribution to the youth and childhood works of Bartók remains unique in this respect
and the Thematisches Verzeichnis could be considered his ‘magnum opus’.
Aside from the historical significance of Dille's Bartók biography of 1939, it is striking that
Dille never wrote ‘the Bartók-biography’ that could have gained international recognition
33
34
Denijs Dille, Het werk van Béla Bartók, Antwerpen, 1979, p. 7.
Denijs Dille, Béla Bartók, Antwerpen, 1974, p. 7
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in research circles. The two books he published in 1974 and 1979 were not written for
an academic audience. Nevertheless, they describe the life and work of Bartók in a
prosaic and rigorous manner. The introductions to these books should be translated into
English and, once annotated, be published. They enable us, after all, to situate Dille’s
research as well as Dille as a researcher in the (historical) context of Bartók-research.
Regard sur le passé should also be fully translated into English. Aside from Dille's main
articles, which were revised until the last moment, Regard sur le passé contains a
number of articles in which he tries to better understand Bartók as a man and as an
artist. And that is what he, ultimately, was after. These articles are of exceptional depth
and reveal as much about Dille as they do about Bartók. I am thinking, in this respect, of
Le vingtième anniversaire de la mort de Bartók, Bartók et Kodály, Bartók, l’homme et
l’artiste, Bartók, folklore et langage.
I would like to leave the last word to Denijs Dille. He wrote it in 1989 for the preface of
Regard sur le passé. Dille was 85 at that time. He could not suspect he would live
another sixteen years: restless, driven and always looking for ‘The True and The
Beautiful’. Some of his favourite verses were taken from from Beaudelaire's Invitation au
voyage:
Là, tout n’est qu’ordre et beauté
Luxe, calme et volupté
When he read these words he always commented: ‘what would that actually mean: luxe,
calme et volupté?’ Ultimately, he didn’t think it was all that important, but ‘it sounds so
beautiful’.
In Beaudelaire he saw the genius he also found in Bartók. The genius he wanted to
fathom. But in the end, he knew and accepted that this was not possible.
In 1989, there is mildness in his words for all those Bartók researchers who are looking
for 'The True' and leaves the last words to Montaigne, the writer who was so dear to
him:
Comme ce sont les dernières pages que je crois consacrer à Bartók, il m’est agréable de
repenser aux années où l’on allait de découverte en découverte. Au terme, il reste quelques
pages dont ce livre présente un vestige que je place sous l’égide de la phrase liminaire des
Essais de Michel de Montaigne «C’est icy un livre de bonne foy, lecteur ». (…) Je puis affirmer
que dans tous les livres, toutes les études consacrées à Bartók que j’ai pu avoir entre les mains,
j’ai rencontré une part de vérité qui m’a instruit ou qui m’a édifié. Du reste, qu’ai-je à juger? Je ne
fais que suivre l’exemple de Montaigne: «Je n’enseigne pas, je raconte.» (Szentendre, janvier
1989) 35
35
Regard, p. 23-24.
14
As these are the last pages I am dedicating to Bartók, it pleases me to think back to the years
when we went from the one discovery to the other. Here, at the end, there are some pages of
which this book presents a trace that I place under the auspices of the opening phrase of the
Essays of Michel de Montaigne, ‘This here is a book of good faith, reader’. (...) I can say that in all
the books, all the studies devoted to Bartók that I have had in my hands, I have found some truth
that has educated me or that has edified me. Besides, who am I to judge? I only follow the
example of Montaigne: ‘I do not teach, I tell’. (Szentendre, January 1989)
15