A pact with the devil is a popular plot not only in the Middle Ages, but also today. He owes much of his fame to Dr. Faust, a character in German legends, whose story was inspired by Johann Goethe. Someone asks the devil for endless knowledge, someone - power or love, and someone - talent. Including musical.
The devil drove with my hand
On October 27, 1782 in the Italian town of Genoa, Niccolo Paganini was born, a man with a "Mephistophelean appearance", violin virtuoso, guitarist and composer. Paganini was one of many whose talent people "justified" with satanic help.
Niccolo Paganini was the third child in the family. His father first worked as a loader, and then kept a shop where he sold mandolins. Noticing his son's talent, he began to teach him music. As a child, Paganini wrote several works for violin, which were difficult for other musicians. The boy played at divine services in churches, and performed not only spiritual, but also secular music.
There is a suspicion that Paganini did not attend school, so he learned to read and write much later than playing the violin. The boy's play amazed professional musicians so much that they refused to teach him - there was nothing more. To improve his skills, Paganini invented and performed complex exercises. And he did them until he fell prostrate in complete exhaustion.
In addition to the violin, Paganini was a virtuoso master of the guitar and wrote for her not only duets with a violin, but also solo works.
However, contemporaries believed that it was not scrupulous daily work that made Paganini a great violinist, but a deal with the devil. It was rumored about the musician that he sold his soul to the devil in order to become a great violinist and earn millions. And even the very appearance of the musician, which was dubbed "Mephistopheles", seemed to confirm the rumors. “He wore a dark gray toe-length coat, which made his figure look very tall. Long black hair in tangled curls fell on his shoulders and, like a dark frame, surrounded his pale, deathly face, on which genius and suffering had left their indelible mark,”the poet Heinrich Heine described his meeting with Paganini.
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According to him, the most accurate portrait of the violinist was created by the deaf artist Lieser. “The devil moved my hand,” Lieser said. It is worth mentioning the artist himself separately - despite his deafness, he was a passionate lover of music and even served as a music critic in a famous Hamburg newspaper. Lieser read about how successful the performance was from the movements of the musicians' fingers.
Contemporaries also noted Paganini's unusual gait - "as if he had iron shackles on his legs." There were rumors about the violinist's entourage. On one of his tours, Paganini took with him George Harris, a comedy writer and collector of anecdotes, to lead the financial side of matters. He was a short, good-natured man, a little luscious and corny.
He looked at Paganini with fear, but did not leave the violinist. The artist Lieser, famous for his sarcasticity, immediately christened Harris the devil himself, who accompanies Paganini in various corporeal forms. In fact, Harris was the musician's secretary - at that time, the violinist's affairs went uphill, and he could no longer cope alone.
Lieser almost pursued Paganini. He painted him in a suit and naked, without skin and just a skeleton, but with a violin in his hands.
Paganini's performances were always sold out. The audience came to the hall long before the maestro entered the stage.
This is how Heinrich Heine described Paganini's concert at the Hamburg Comedy Theater: “A dark figure appeared on the stage, which seemed to have just emerged from the underworld. It was Paganini who appeared in his black ceremonial attire: a black tailcoat, a black vest of a terrifying cut, perhaps prescribed by hellish etiquette at the court of Proserpine. Black pantaloons dangled miserably along his skinny legs. There was something frighteningly wooden and at the same time something senseless animal in the angular movements of his body, so these bows should inevitably excite laughter; but his face, which seemed even more deathly pale in the bright light of the ramp, expressed at that moment such a plea, such an unthinkable humiliation that the laughter fell silent, suppressed by some terrible pity."
Who was Paganini? This question tormented his contemporaries. Some considered him an unhappy man who, with his last strength - and Paganini suffered from many chronic diseases - tried to amuse the boisterous audience. Others insisted that the musician was none other than "a dead man who rose from a coffin, a vampire with a violin in his hands."
Much later, scientists explained the origin of Paganini's "devilish appearance". The musician suffered from a rare genetic disease - Marfan syndrome. This disease is characterized by long limbs, scoliosis, joint mobility, and vision problems.
Satan's Trills
Paganini was not the first violinist to be accused of making a deal with the devil. In 1692, Giuseppe Tartini, the future violinist and composer, was born in the city of Pirano (now Slovenia).
Tartini has an interesting fate. The family wanted the boy to choose a church career, but he entered law school. And after a year of study, he kidnapped the niece of Cardinal Cornaro and married her, because of which Tartini had to hide from the Roman police. He hid in one of the monasteries and under a false name.
Tartini made a great contribution to the art of violin playing. He improved the design of the bow and developed the basic techniques of using it. The musician wrote a huge number of works - there were 175 sonatas for violin alone. The most popular is his sonata Sonate du diable, that is, "The Devil's Sonata". Tartini said that the devil himself performed it for him in a dream. Hence the rumors.
Crossroads blues
Let's go now from Old Europe to the shores of the Mississippi, that is, in the USA at the beginning of the 20th century - the heyday of the blues. It was there - in the small town of Hazelhurst - that Robert Johnson, the greatest bluesman of the 20th century and the "founder" of the notorious Club 27, was born in 1911, which was later "joined" by Kurt Cobain, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and other musicians who burned out at the age of 27.
The story of Robert Johnson began in the summer of 1930 in Robinsonville, when the Son House jumped from a passing truck. The brightest to represent the delta blues, which did not achieve much popularity, but had a huge impact on the development of the blues. Son House visited his bosom friend Willie Brown, with whom they soon began performing at blues parties.
Johnson was so mesmerized by the musicians' playing that he dragged around everywhere, dreaming of performing on the same stage. House and Brown treated him condescendingly, but with a laugh - the guy did not know how to play at all. After some time, the aspiring bluesman disappeared, and when he returned, the level of his skill increased many times.
Johnson answered all the questions that he made a deal with the devil at a magic crossroads - he sold his soul in exchange for the ability to play the blues. This is an old legend. At the time, the blues was considered the music of Satan. And, if someone with all his heart wanted to master the skill, then it was necessary … no, no endless rehearsals! Why, if there is a mystical way. I had to take a guitar and go to a crossroads in a remote area. At night and with a full moon. Then the devil will appear and offer a deal - the ability to perfectly, without particularly straining, play the blues in exchange for an immortal soul. Later Johnson will devote a couple of songs to this bike - Me and the devil blues and Crossroad Blues, for example.
A memorial sign installed at the site where Johnson sold his soul to the devil.
In fact, Johnson was in his hometown of Hazelhurst all this time, where he met bluesman Ike Zinnerman. By the way, he learned to play the blues at night in cemeteries - why not mysticism? Zinnerman became for Robert something of a spiritual father - he opened the door for him to a world that Johnson considered inaccessible - the world of the blues.
One evening, Son House and Willie Brown were performing at a small club near Robinsonville when the door suddenly opened and Robert Johnson came in with a guitar on his back. He was absent for over a year and was remembered as a young lad who absurdly beat the strings and bellowed something unintelligible. Robert made his way through the crowd to the stage and began to play. There was silence. Nobody could believe that this puny boy, who in the past could barely hold a guitar in his hands, could play like that.
Glory Johnson paced ahead of him along the swampy banks of the Mississippi. Almost in an instant, his life changed: he became a welcome guest at blues parties, any beauty was ready to jump into his bed, and the flask was never empty. For the time being, it is difficult to be a debtor to the devil himself.
It was August 1938. The road took Robert Johnson to a place called Three Forks near Greenwood. He performed here in the evenings, and one day a black beauty laid eyes on the musician, who turned out to be the wife of … the owner of the establishment. And it seems that he found out about it.
In the midst of the party, Johnson was treated to a beer. After some time, the musician felt bad, but he did not stop, continuing to play his devilish blues. By two o'clock in the morning, Johnson's condition became critical - he was taken to Greenwood to see a doctor. A few days later, the legendary bluesman passed away. They say from strychnine poisoning. At the time of his death, he wrote 29 songs and conducted three recording sessions.
By the way, at the place where Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the devil, a memorial sign was installed. It is at the intersection of Highway 61 and 49, in Clarksdale, Mississippi, USA.