The Violin Player

Semi-biographical story

When as a child I asked why my grand-parents were always on the move, I would only get quick, broken sentences. It wasn’t until recently that I was told this amazing story:

 On that Sunday Giacomo got up when the sky was still dark. He pushed open the wooden shutters of his bedroom and looked out into the night. The stars were flickering over the sloped roofs of the still village. Orion was the brightest of all and to the east Sagittarius was drawing his bow aiming to shoot an arrow into the blackness. In that instant of profound beauty, when the world seemed to hold its breath, Giacomo felt a strange emotion washing over him as if something was missing in his life.

   Twenty-five years of age, he had lived and worked as a carpenter in Santa Maria di Sala, a little farming village set at the centre of the Venetian countryside, since he had left the orphanage almost ten years before. Now it was 1963 and he found it still hard to believe that he had managed to build for himself a reputation among the villagers as a trustworthy, hard-working man.  

   Gazing at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, he shaved, combed his moustache and brushed back his dark, wavy hair rubbing it with a few drops of olive oil to make it shine. He frowned a little, thinking back to those long years spent inside the tall stone building up in the mountains. There was so little time for playing and he had often felt lonely despite the fact he was among a lot of other boys.

   Yet, in that boarding school his small hands had grown strong and skilled. The monks had taught him how to cut and shape the wood and then to create beautiful crafted pieces for people to furnish their homes with. The endless chilly winter nights were filled with the mellow tunes of the violin that old Father Basilio had taught him to play. He looked down at his big, capable hands. No matter how heavily he rubbed his fingernails, they would be rimmed with black polish and glue forever.    

   Back in the bedroom, he picked up the black violin case, put it over his shoulder and walked out into the cool autumn breeze. As he headed for the mountains in his round-topped Fiat Topolino, the villages on both sides of the road slowly began to wake up. By the time he reached the alpine village of Belmonte, with its characteristic barns of stone and wood, the sun was lighting up the soaring peaks of the Dolomites with a rosy glow.

   Giacomo smiled as his powerful voice rolled out of the car window striking up an aria:

                                        La donna è mobile, qual piuma al vento...

 At once he was filled with excitement and a kind of expectation. He was still a bachelor, he mused, and that was rather unusual. Most men at his age had already settled down, with a wife and a couple of kids running around the house. Will he ever meet his soul mate? Maybe a pretty but flighty woman, like the one in Verdi’s Rigoletto...?

    After parking the car at the edge of the road, he started climbing up the mountain path, his pace steady and safe – the violin case swinging across his back. He had hiked for almost an hour across the open green valleys of Val di Fassa -barely meeting anyone- when the impressive silhouettes of the red fir trees emerged on the skyline. He stopped, his heart pounding with emotion. He felt like an arrow that had reached its target: the Forest of the Violins stood dramatically in front of him, like a stage from behind a curtain.

    He made his way further into the thick woodland, where the long shadows of the trees were dancing with the sun light and the cool autumn breeze carried in a whiff of moss and resin. Then he sat cross-legged against the trunk of a large fir tree, on a wide carpet of pine needles. Holding the violin under his chin, Giacomo lifted the bow and, his lids resting, he began to play his favourite piece, Albinoni’s Adagio.

   As his fingers lightly moved across the strings, a wave of melodious notes flowed from the instrument into the air. The music gradually expanded reaching its highest intensity and he felt the core of the old fir tree slightly vibrate against his back. Soon it was as if the music was bouncing from tree to tree till the whole forest was resonating with a single voice.

   Giacomo was so taken away by his inspiration and exciting feelings that he hardly became aware of a sudden draft whirling around him. He opened his eyes and there she was: light and airy, her feet and arms moving gently in harmony with his tune. A young girl, probably sixteen he reckoned, with a long fluttering skirt and a fringed red shawl around her shoulders. She was so gracious and her face so radiant that she looked almost surreal.

   “Ciao, where do you come from?” Giacomo asked in a soft voice, fearing she might disappear.

   She stopped and lifted her eyes, “Ciao, my name is Esther and I come from where the sun rises.” She spoke Italian with a slightly foreign accent.

   “I’m not sure I understand...” said Giacomo mesmerized by her big, almond-shaped eyes that seemed to smile.

   “I am Romany,” she went on. “My people follow the stars and live on wheels. We are camped at the edge of the forest. Why are you playing alone among the trees?”

   It was then that Giacomo noticed her dark complexion and the long, dark ringlets dropping loosely around her shoulders. Her smile was broad and spontaneous, her lips full and the rhythmic way she moved her sensual body reminded him of the zingarelle, the gypsies in the Aida that he had recently seen in the theatre in Venice.

   His face broke into a smile from beneath his moustache. “My name is Giacomo,” he said. Then he patted the ground, “Come, I’d love to tell you a story.”

   Esther sat down under the large fir tree next to him. She smelled of grass and honey.

   “Many, many years ago,” Giacomo started, “a man called Stradivari would wander around this forest on an autumn day until he chose his favourite fir tree. It had to be tall and hundreds of years old. Like this one, he said, patting the thick bark of the tree.”

   “How amazing,” said Esther with a startled expression on her face.

   Giacomo realised that she was hooked and so he went on.

   “The man had found out that in the autumn months, when the sap stops running inside the trunk of the red fir tree, its wood becomes a natural sound box. He started to carve his own violins out of these trees and he became a famous violin maker. Since then this woodland has been known as the Foresta dei Violini.”

   “Oh, I see. And are you going to build a violin out of this tree?”

   “Si, one day I will. Do you like my music?”

   “Si,” said Esther. “When your violin plays, it speaks to Baxt, the soul inside the trees, and the forest starts singing and dancing. We do the same. In the evenings we like to gather around the open fire and while the old tell their stories, the men play their guitars and violins. We sing and dance and the creatures of the night come out of the trees to dance with us...”

   Then Esther took his right hand in hers and began stroking the thick veins, the firm knuckles and the work-hardened skin on his fingers.

 “I can see that you work with polish and glue; and your hands carve and shape the souls of the wood.”

   Giacomo’s eyes smiled as he nodded. Esther now was concentrating on the deep lines across his palm. Her forefront frowned and she shook her head.

   “Uhm... your heart line tells me you are a lonely man and from your life line I can see ... I can see sadness in your past and ...”

   “That’s true,” interrupted Giacomo with sudden emotion in his voice. “My parents died in the bombing during the war and I was raised by the monks in an orphanage not far from here.” Then he smiled. The last thing he wanted was to break the spell of the moment with some sad recollection about his past.

   It all seemed so peaceful and still inside the forest that Giacomo now realised he had completely lost track of time. All of a sudden he felt everything was moving very quickly and he had to take his decisions rapidly.

   “Can I see you again?” he then asked.

   But Esther stood up and gently smoothed her skirt. Her dark eyes became intent.

   “I have to go back to my caravan now,” she said almost reluctantly. Then, in a soft voice, she began to explain to him that her father and people would soon be restless again, and they would be moving yet again to another village and then another place...”

   Giacomo saw that a few sunrays streaming through the gaps of the thick vegetation were lighting Esther’s body with a golden glow. He looked into her eyes, his voice slightly trembling.

   “Would you rather like to come with me? May be you can stop travelling and we can start a new life together.” 

   As his words faded into silence he glimpsed a hint of melancholy in her face.

   “If I run away with you, I’ll bring shame to my family and people. I’ll never be able to go back again.”

   Giacomo’s voice trembled as he whispered, “I’ll take care of you. I’ve finally found that which I felt was missing within me.”

   Esther’s big eyes moved from beneath her thick eyebrows as she reflected. She was absolutely free to do as she pleased, Giacomo said to her tenderly. Yet, he would like to have a talk with her father and family to reassure them that there was nothing to fear. He would look after her from now on.

   There was a moment of stillness when the whole forest seemed to wait for Esther’s decision.

   “I’ll come with you only on one condition,’ she said, ‘that every twelve months, when the moon is full and Sagittarius is the brightest in the sky, drawing his bow and ready to shoot his arrow against the night, we will then move to a new place.”

The revelation has filled my own life with a desire for adventure and the almost uncontrollable urge to see distant, unknown places ever since.

 
Copyright by the author