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INTRODUCTION
2. What does the bertsolari sing? 3. Achieving a balance amongst the challenges. What are roots for?
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2 What
does the bertsolari sing? One of the
key factors in the social response which bertsolarimo arouses in a modern
society such as the Basque-speaking one is the fact that the bertsolari
sings forms and contents which connect with a wide cross-section of the
audience. A public which is primarily urban, in an industrial society,
with university-educated youth, widely travelled and so on. A wide and
changing audience. What does the bertsolari sing which allows him, with
a degree of success, to connect with the present-day audience? In principle
at least, the bertsolari addresses every aspect of social and personal
life. This is one of the important points in the topicality of bertsolaritza:
the bertsolari sings of life. It is not just that he doesn’t rule
out as a theme any ambit of life, but rather that he makes an express
effort to make every aspect of life singable, dealt with through improvisation. Obviously,
many aspects of life do escape him: if the subject matter is of little
interest for the times or it represents a subconscious taboo in the society
of the day, then the same is true for it in the bertsos. But all those
areas which, to put it at its crudest, are discussed at the kitchen table,
in the bar or on the radio talk shows, can also be dealt with in the performance
of the bertsolaris. Indeed, we could go so far as to say that subjects
which receive little attention in everyday circles are reflected
in bertsolarimo, due to the eagerness and zeal for new subjects and approaches
which have been manifest in bertsolaris performances in recent years. List of subjects
employed in the final of the most recent championship. Below we have brought together some of the themes to which improvised verse singing in Basque alludes to in confrontation format or by the individual bertsolari responding to the theme-prompter. That is to say, we are not here transcribing the whole theme proposed (it often has a longer formulation with a giving out of parts in imaginary, concrete, etc., situations), but we are providing key references to them.
Key words in special exercises proposed for that day:
Bertsolaritza
is a type of alternative communication circuit where (at times in ironic
tone, at others in humorous voice or in poetic register) national, state,
local or international current affairs are ruminated on. The verb
ruminate is suggestive in this context. The cow regurgitates the unchewed
grass previously introduced to her stomach and she quietly masticates
it, only to gulp it down once again, now mixed with her own juices. The
average, modern western citizen gulps down mass-media information to saturation
point and the inability to digest all that information is one of the characteristics
of (post)-modern man. Bertsolarimo affords a small opportunity to ruminate
on part of that information in a humorous, personal or poetic way, doing
so in an artistic, participatory and collective activity. One might
question the intellectual value of the bertsolari’s improvisation
on a topic of the day or a universal question. It could be argued that
it is very insignificant given that intellectual contribution requires
learned scientific treatises or long literary works. There are, however,
those who see significant contributions in improvisation. In any case,
the bertsolaris ruminate, mixing, via poetic and entertaining extemporisation,
various strands of information which they introduce, entertain themselves
with and, when they get it right, cause others to be entertained. The contribution
of the bertsolari, if they do contribute anything to these subjects, is
precisely in this mixture, the mixture of levels, the treatment of current
social, political, sexual, cultural and local affairs together with references
to the situation of their audience, all impregnated with personal allusions
and in discord with the messages of their fellow improvisers. It is in
that blend of levels (in that juxtaposition of comment about sheep-cloning
with a remark about the theme-prompter’s ears, the incongruity of
talk of a death or the E.T.A. truce alongside comment on his companion’s
emotions) wherein the originality of the improvisation operates, and where,
from time to time, memorable pieces arise. In this alternative
circuit of rumination on social and personal information, the bertsolari
plays a role somewhere between the social and the poetic, between leader
and fool, between columnist and satiric newspaper cartoonist, while at
the same time remaining an ordinary member of his social milieu. The bertsolaritza
performances, which, as was indicated in section I-3.a, exceed a thousand
a year, the significant audience numbers, and the inherent complicity
in this type of communication all go to make the bertsolari a figure of
reference on social opinion of no little importance within the Basque-speaking
community. |