Tzigane

"Tzigane" also means "gypsy": see Gypsy (disambiguation)."

"Tzigane" is a rhapsodic composition by the French composer Maurice Ravel. It was originally written for violin with Luthéal accompaniment in 1924, and dedicated to the Hungarian violinist Jelly d'Arányi.

Later versions replaced the original accompanying instrument by piano, or orchestra.

The name of the piece is derived from the generic European term for "gypsy" (in French: gitan, tsigane or tzigane rather than the Hungarian "cigány") although it does not use any authentic Gypsy melodies. Note that in Ravel's days in Paris gypsy/gitan/tsigane/tzigane did not so much refer to the Roma (Gypsy) people in any strict sense: the "gypsy" style of the work was rather a kind of popular musical exoticism, comparable to the "Spanish" exoticism in Ravel's day (compare Chabrier's "España"), or the "Janissary" exotism in Mozart's day ("Alla Turca").

The Luthéal was, in Ravel's day, a comparatively new piano-like instrument that had several tone-colour (not exclusively "pitch") registers that could be engaged by pulling stops above the keyboard. One of these registers had a cimbalom-like sound, which fitted well with the gypsy-esque idea of the composition. The printed version of the original score of the "Tzigane" piece contained instructions for these register-changes during execution. The Luthéal, however, never really made it as a fashionable music instrument. By the end of the 20th century the first print of the "Luthéal" version of the accompaniment was still available at the publishers, but by that time the chamber music version of the piece relied on the piano as accompanying instrument. In this sense "Tzigane" is comparable to Schubert's "arpeggione" sonata: that piece was also written in order to promote a new uncommon instrument, and when the "composition" proved more popular than the "instrument" a few years later, execution shifted to a more common instrument (cello and viola in Schubert's case).

"Tzigane" is often performed as an arrangement (by Ravel himself) for solo violin and orchestra. Though the composer is almost universally regarded as following a mainly Impressionist idiom, 'Tzigane' clearly demonstrates Ravel's ability to imitate the (late) Romantic style of violin showmanship promoted by such composer-virtuosi as Paganini and Sarasate.