Hungarians once used the ancient tarogatoa deep-toned, clarinet-like woodwind of remote Tibetan ancestrymuch as the Romans, and the Scots and Irish after them, used the bagpipe: the tarogato's sound was a stirring call to war. In skirmishes with their Austrian rulers in the early 17003, patriotic tarogato players could arouse their fellow peasants to wild combat fury merely by playing their favorite songs of freedom. The annoyed
Austrians finally saw the point, and burned every tarogato they could find.
But a few of the instruments survived, and one 130-year-old copy turned up at Manhattan's Carnegie Hall last week in the hands of...
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