A Vague Cello Update

I missed a week of orchestra and a cello lesson while I was away, and my lesson this weekend has also been cancelled because my teacher is out of town for her birthday. I have no problem with that; I will just work on my Bach gavotte on my own. I will turn it into a celloy operatic aria, and surprise my teacher when we finally do get together again at the beginning of May. (May! Good grief.)

We had a group lesson on Sunday, where only half the older students could make it (the younger ones have their own group lesson just before we do). It was pretty focused, though, and things are starting to come together. My teacher ended up deciding to transpose the accompaniment for one of the quartet pieces, so I'm transposing it on my own, something I do because I think it will be good for me, but I'm always worried I will make tonnes of mistakes.

This past rehearsal at orchestra we went in early. There is a Beaver colony that meets in the church basement right before we use it, and they arranged for us to do a presentation for them. It was a lot of fun. They had a basic intro before we got there, and a chance to explore the timpani, then they coloured some handouts while we all set up. Our conductor introduced the instruments one by one, having the principal of each section play the first phrase of "Twinkle" so the boys could hear how they sounded different. Then we played the first half of the first movement of the Haydn Symphony 83 that we'd done for the last concert so they could listen for the chicken theme, and after that we played one of our new pieces, Elgar's Pomp & Circumstance march no. 4. It was very enjoyable; they were bright and responsive. When things were breaking up at the end their leader told us that they were the biggest group in the West Island; other colonies had between five and ten kids, but they had thirty! "I like to think it's our great programming," he said.

Then we spent the entire night on the first movement of the Mendelssohn, with a play-through of the second movement at the end. Lots of really hard work. Our conductor assures us that the first movement is the hardest thing in the concert. If pressed to name a favourite symphony of all time, I would have to say it is this one, Mendelssohn's Reformation symphony, so I am loving every single moment of this. Playing a piece of music in orchestra means I get to break music down and visit it from the inside out, something that adds infinite richness to my enjoyment of the music both on the stand and via a CD player, and I'm so incredibly thrilled to have the opportunity to do that with this piece.

My back was murderously painful, though. Stacking wooden chairs that slant backwards are not optimal for a cello payer to begin with, but my lower back was moderately screwed up thanks to two train rides and a week of sleeping in a bed not my own. I stretched it out as best I could at the break, and ended up on the floor to try to give it some relief. It had gotten steadily worse after I got home; I finally asked HRH to massage it and get rid of the walnut-sized knot on the left side, and that plus some tiger balm seems to have helped a lot. I really, really need to get one of those firm orthopaedic wedge cushions that a couple of the other cellists in the section use.

* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal

March 2010 Summary (to date)

1 March 2010:

Saturday morning I had my cello lesson, which was notable for happening half an hour after I woke up. I’d been sleeping badly and HRH decided to let me sleep in, which was lovely, but then he realised at 8:26 that I had a cello lesson at 9:00, and woke me up when I’m usually stepping out the door. I got dressed in record time, he made me tea in my travel mug, and I flew out to the West Island. The lesson was pretty good. It’s nice to be asked, “How long have we been working on this étude?” and to answer, “Well, actually, you assigned it last week and this is the first time I’ve played it for you,” and then hear the teacher say, “Well, you’ve done what you needed to do with that, let’s look at the next one.”

I asked to work on ‘The Entertainer’, which we’re playing in a quartet arrangement for the June recital, and gah. I’m playing Cello 2, and there were some rhythmic things that I just wasn’t getting. My teacher tried all sorts of rearrangements and subdivisions to help me get it, and they just succeeded in confusing me more. I’m a very basic kind of ‘just play the correct rhythm for me and I’ll internalize it’ kind of girl; rhythm tricks just worsen my muddle. I got it in the end, mainly because a few bars later the same rhythm showed up with different notes, only preceded by two eighth notes instead of a quarter note and that seemed to make all the difference. Then we moved to the Boccherini minuet.

Oh, Boccherini. Really.

I have a hate/love relationship with pops and chestnuts. They’re overplayed and so I grit my teeth at them, turn them off when I can, and resist them. If I have to play them, I discover all sorts of lovely things about their internal workings, admit there’s a reason for their popularity, find something to like about them when I hear them, but I still don’t enjoy them. Boccherini’s Minuet is a classic example of an overplayed pop that I hate. And I hate it all the more now that I have to play it, because those opening sixteenth notes are a huge obstacle for me. I can play them in the repeats, but starting from a static bow? Gah. No.

It’s one of those pieces that is all about bow speed and weight and control and I’m sure it’s very character-building, but I’m hating myself because I can’t flipping get that mini-run of sixteenth notes. My teacher pointed out that I can play the piece with my left hand, and that I regularly play much harder pieces in orchestra. (In fact, she expanded that to cover all the Suzuki material I’ve done and will do, which was very gratifying to hear, since sometimes I beat myself up about being on book three after playing for sixteen years.) The point of this is to work the right hand, and my problem does in fact lie entirely with the bow. From a dead stop, I can’t micro-manage the speed to get that lovely sort of swoop and jump for precise phrasing on those two first bars. (There’s an argument in the music world about the validity of the Suzuki method for adults, and what people tend to forget is that review is a huge part of the method. Yes, after sixteen years, you can go back to the earlier books and work on the pieces with all your knowledge and still find technique to polish. The method is a philosophy, not just a set of books.)

We spent the last ten minutes focusing on phrasing those two bars and trying to play them over and over, and I finally said I had to stop because it was getting worse and I was tensing up and losing control of bow and phrasing entirely, and it was doing more harm than good. That’s the kind of thing that stays with me, and despite the lesson overall being great, I had to keep telling myself not to brood about it on the way home.

8 March 2010:

I took the cello downstairs to practice in the basement because I had a lesson scheduled for that night and I wouldn’t be able to play in my office like I usually do since everyone was home. I regret not practising downstairs before, because the sound is phenomenal down there. And the phenomenal sound went with me to the lesson, which was great. We are moving on from Boccherini and working on Webster’s Scherzo now, which is nice for the change, but is also all about the incredibly controlled bow movement.

9 March 2010:

It’s that time of year again! The Lakeshore Chamber Orchestra proudly announces their spring 2010 concert.

Date: Saturday the 27 of March
Time: 19h30
Location: Beaurepaire United Church, 25 Fieldfare Ave, Beaconsfield
Admission: $10, free for children under 18

Programme:
The Wasps Overture - Vaughn Williams
Symphony no. 83 (’The Hen’) - Haydn
Méditation from Thaïs - Massenet
The Banks of Green Willow - Butterworth
Petit Suite - Debussy

This is a gorgeous programme. The concerts usually last approximately two hours, including the refreshment break. There are driving directions and public transport info on the church website, linked above. I usually encourage people who are vehicle-less to find someone who has a car and share the cost of the driver’s admission to the concert among them. It’s more fun to enjoy the evening in the company of others, after all.

Mark your calendars now! And feel free to share the information with anyone you like; it’s a public concert. See you there!

11 March 2010:

I am giddy to announce the release of A Modern Cellist’s Manual by Emily Wright. I had the very enjoyable task of editing this book.

A very different sort of cello method, A Modern Cellist’s Manual combines technical information and plenty of photographs with advice on approach. Topics addressed range from the basics of a painless bow grip to injury avoidance, working with a metronome, and tenor clef. Emily’s tone and sense of humor lighten the mood of any practice session. A Modern Cellist’s Manual is suitable for those taking private lessons as well as returning cellists looking to bolster rusty technique.

A Modern Cellist’s Manual can be purchased via Lulu.com for now, and should be listed at major online retailers eventually.

Congratulations, Emily. You’ve worked hard for this. And for those who read it and want more… I have it on good authority that she’s working on it.

15 March 2010:

Saturday was a great lesson with some excellent breakthroughs (such as one doesn’t move one’s left elbow forward while crossing strings, one moves one’s forearm, so as to avoiding “breaking” the wrist; I love making discoveries like that), but it was an intense lesson and very draining.

Sunday we had our monthly group cello lesson, where I played my lines rather better than I’d anticipated. It’s so much easier when you hear the other lines and figure out where your line fits in (Yes, I realise this contradicts my complaint of last month, where I said that I couldn’t play my line because I didn’t know how it fit in. Yesterday was magically different. Or I practised the new material. One of the two.) We also sight-read two pieces, a cello quartet arrangement of the theme from Haydn’s quartet op 76 no 3 (we sight-read this one last time, too, but we all had different parts this time; last time I think I had the viola part, and this time I had the first violin) and a piece by Rameau.

22 March 2010:

On Friday night I had my cello lesson where some things fell apart, and others worked. I guess overall it was good, but there were parts that left me really down. This is the part of the-tearing-apart-current-technique process I hate. I know to expect sounding awful while my brain and muscles struggle to implement new info, but it doesn’t do much for feeling good about yourself or your work. A new étude that my teacher assigned had me trying to figure out what it sounded like, and I finally made the connection: it was in the same key and rhythmic pattern as the piece my teacher had suggested doing for the spring recital back in January, the Bach Gavotte from the third Suzuki book, a piece I love. I shared this insight with her and she was slightly taken aback, because we haven’t started it yet and usually she prefers students to present a polished piece they’ve worked on for a good long time. So there was miscommunication: I expected her to assign it when she thought it was time, and she perhaps forgot or had just been thinking aloud. She suggested doing the Lully Gavotte instead, but told me to work on both as the Lully has lots of stuff we can apply to the Bach, and if the Bach is good enough we can do that. We have three months; we’ll see what happens.

February 2010 Summary

17 February 2010:

After a severe setback yesterday wherein I lost most of the day to researching ways to embed fonts on a Mac, and then finding that using Open Office to make a PDF had resulted in borking my document (it was supposed to make things easier!), I finally finished the cello manual layout and proofing today.

It’s been a really fun six weeks, taking a text document and doing a basic layout, then a copyedit, then the endless tweaking that happens when two people trade a document back and forth once a week for a while. Some of that tweaking was to condense the layout; some fixed things that became problematic; some involved adding material; some fixed errors that popped up thanks to the document format. Still, six weeks from plain text to a finished PDF ready for printing is a really good timeline for two busy people. (I come from a publishing world where three to six months for all this is the norm!) I’m crossing my fingers that there aren’t any problems with the printing process. (That’s what all the PDF and font-embedding strife was about. It was a whole thing.)

And today, apart from finishing the book PDF, I managed to wipe myself out having a shower, scrubbing the bathroom, and doing yoga. The fibro is really in my bad books these days. It would help if it gave me some sort of warning sign instead of just handing me a tonne of fatigue and pain all at once when everything seems to be going well.

I have a freelance project due on Friday that I really wanted done earlier this week, but PDFs and fibro are messing that up. I have orchestra tonight, and I fully expect to perform horribly despite practising this week. It occurred to me that I might discuss dropping orchestra with my teacher. Or taking a break. It’s been a really tough winter for me in a lot of ways, and orchestra’s getting trounced in my priority list. I love this new conductor, and I love the music, but I just can’t handle it capably. I know the rest of the section feels the same way, though, so I suspect I’m overreacting in a maudlin self-defeatist fashion borne of fatigue. Still; I really don’t want to drop it, but I feel so stressed about it that I don’t know if the tradeoff is worth it.

Time for winter to be over, I think. The cold and damp is really bothering the fibro.

18 February 2010:

The thing is, if you stick with something long enough, the bad parts usually get better.

Yes, orchestra rocked. Why would I drop something that challenges and rewards me? When it’s going badly it’s bad, but when it works, when everything comes together, it’s glorious. And I wouldn’t give that up.

Besides, Butterworth’s “The Banks of Green Willow” alone makes up for any frustration. (Including the frustrating passage of stormy strings a third of the way through where everything sounds like it’s falling apart, but is actually building before the absolutely gorgeous climax.) I’ve played some very pretty things, but I find this piece absolutely spectacular and it gets me every time. The transition in the middle is throat-clenchingly exquisite, and then the arrangement of the folk song at the end (the same one that Vaughn Williams used as the second movement of his Folk Song Suite, “The Bonny Boy”; Butterworth and Vaughn Williams were both interested in English folk songs, and Butterworth worked with Cecil Sharp to collect them) is gentle and ethereally beautiful in its simplicity.

I loved this piece even before I found out that Butterworth was killed in the First World War, after destroying the music he though unworthy of survival should he not return. His remaining catalogue is slim, and you can’t help but wonder what he destroyed, and what he might have composed had he lived through the war. Knowing it’s one of the few pieces that survived makes it all the more precious.

23 February 2010:

My monthly group cello lesson later that afternoon was great; we had a new student there, and did some good work on the Corelli. I’m having a stupid time counting, for some reason; I got lost in the middle of everything that I wasn’t playing the first cello line for (I’m fine with first and whatever the bottom line is, but I’m wobbly on the middle voices because I’m not sure how the harmonies are supposed to move or sound like yet). Despite this, our first read-through of Joplin’s “The Entertainer” went pretty well. We sight-read a new piece, “Soldier’s Joy,” that will be paired with “The Ashokan Farewell,” as well as getting the official new music for our quartets and trios. I really enjoy my group lessons, and I wish we could do them more often, although I know they’re a tonne of work for my teacher and the scheduling is enough of a nightmare.

January 2010 Summary

11 January 2010:

Saturday morning I had my first cello lesson of the year, and it went well. This may have had something to do with the hour and a half of work I did on Friday reacquainting myself with book 3, or the beautiful weather (cold, but sunny and still) but whatever the reason, I was in a terrific mood, and pulled off a decent Gavotte. We then filled my slate with working on the musicality of the Gavotte, the 3rd pos Ruined Castle tonalisation, and the Boccherini minuet. (Good grief, what is the Boccherini doing so early in book 3?) And with the pile of work we have to do for orchestra, that’s going to be plenty. When one’s teacher shakes her head over the orchestra material and says, “This is going to be a challenging programme,” you know you’re in for it. I’ve been very afraid to look at the orchestra material. As much as I love it all, it’s hard, and I know that means I will love it less very soon, and least of all right before the concert. It will take a couple of months before I enjoy it again.

I also have to keep reminding myself that the work I’m doing in the Suzuki material is supplementing my orchestral development in particular, and my musicality in general. It’s not like I’ve never used third position, or extended shifts, or seen these keys before. I’ve reviewing things I’ve learned elsewhere, and using simpler pieces to work bits of technique and provide a relatively easy environment to play with musical expression. I need to get past the oddness of telling people that I’m on book three, but I’ve been playing for fifteen years. (Whoa; I just checked, and I started in July 1994. That means we’re rapidly coming up on sixteen years.)

18 January 2010:

Going back into last week a bit, the layout of the cello manual is going very well, and it’s looking more and more like a real book. Today I get to finish photo sizing, adjusting placement, and adding captions, and then I have to look at the ordering of sections to maximize the use of the space available so that people don’t have to turn pages in the middle of an exercise or to compare the before/after kinds of photos.

Saturday morning I had my weekly cello lesson, where we worked on musicality, using the Lully Gavotte as the focus. I learned a tonne of stuff about using the weight of my bow arm and staying in the string, which was really nice considering I hadn’t worked on my lesson stuff at all during the week. (There was lots of work, and orchestra, and I looked at the orchestra stuff and not the lesson stuff, okay?) We looked at the Boccherini minuet, which I’m starting next, and talked about my solo for the spring recital; I think I’m going to do the Bach Gavotte in C minor. On Sunday I packed up my cello and music and drove to my monthly group lesson. It was the first one of the new year, and I love getting new music. We’re doing a lovely quartet arrangement of The Entertainer, a trio arrangement of Ashokan Farewell, and a quintet arrangement of a Corelli theme, and the sight-reading went pretty well in general. We finished by sight-reading some quartet and trio arrangements of some of the Suzuki material, trying them out to help our teacher decide what to programme.

21 January 2010:

[Part of the 2009 year-in-review post]

Things I Did In 2009 That I Have Never Done Before:

Bought a brand-new cello.

Sold my primary musical instrument (to someone very deserving!).

Things I Did in 2009 Of Which I Am Proud:

I bought a new cello. If you follow my journal regularly you were privy to the angst I felt about the whole buying a new 7/8 cello when the 4/4 I had was so very excellent an instrument. This was a huge issue for me, because I had to deal with my preconceptions regarding thrift and what I deserve versus going overboard, and what constitutes any of those things. I am very, very happy with my choice to sell my first cello and buy this brand-new 7/8. The sound is evolving nicely and we play well together. We’re a good fit. This was HUGE for me. I am so very proud of myself for taking this enormously weighty step.

I am very proud of not quitting my cello lessons. As of mid-October it was one full year of lessons down, and I can tell that my technique has improved by leaps and bounds. I wasn’t ever really in danger of quitting them entirely, but I came close to asking to move to a biweekly schedule for the sake of finances, a move that would have had negative repercussions on my development.

I am proud of sticking it out in second chair at orchestra and not asking to be moved. I really, really struggled with the music this past fall, and I came very close to asking to be switched. Actually, I did ask, indirectly; I told the section leader that if she wanted to rotate me to the back to give someone else a chance, I’d be fine with that. She immediately vetoed that idea, which felt nice on one hand, but made my heart sink a little on the other. I’m sure this is very character-building for me.

Uneven Dress Rehearsal...

... hopefully even recital, right?

This morning we had our dress rehearsal for tomorrow's recital. The ensemble stuff sounded great, except for one piece, which admittedly did sound better once we'd had a break and retuned. Our duet sounded mostly all right (I know hearing notes slightly out of tune is normal for performance, because one's hearing goes hyper-critical) except for the bit where I relaxed in the repeat of the A section. I glanced away from my music, and when I looked back I had no idea where we were. I quickly ran out of what I remembered of the two bars following and had to stop playing until I figured out where my partner was. Very embarrassing; thank goodness it happened at the dress, so it won't happen at the recital itself. We ended up cutting the repeat (which makes sense apart from my gaffe, as the A section is forty bars and quite long enough on its own), which reduces my chances of over-relaxing and losing my place. The other solos sounded terrific. It's going to be a good recital.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
~

Ongoing

I read pretty much the entirety of Perri Knize's Grand Obsession in one day. It was fabulous. I was worried at one or two points that it was going to veer a bit too far into the mystical (and coming from me that's saying something) but it righted itself in time. After all, how do you define how music affects us? It's a twofold story about a woman deciding to study piano in middle age and buying one, then trying to understand what the personal connection to a specific instrument is (not violin or cello or piano, but one specific example of the chosen instrument), and an exploration of how pianos are built and maintained. Really engaging and quite enjoyable.

We had our second rehearsal with our third guest conductor, and I enjoyed it even more than the first. He's good. There is a problem with his voice carrying to the back, but he's terrific in his bilingualism, and his musicality and his interaction are fabulous. He knows exactly what to work to smooth out problems, and how to phrase what he's looking for. We've added Grieg's Norwegian Dances to the programme, and (hurrah!) Vaughn Williams' English Folk Song suite. Of course, the Vaughn Williams starts in A-flat major (F minor? no, pretty sure it's Ab) which is four flats, augh! I have enough trouble remembering to flatten my As, and he wants me to flatten my Ds as well? But it is Vaughn Williams and I am over the moon.

Also in cello news, while I was working on some ensemble stuff earlier this week and trying to isolate why my intonation was unstable, my left elbow kind of said, "Oh, I've got it," and moved a millimetre or two forward on the horizontal axis, all on its own. And it solved the problem. I was amazed and very grateful to it. Perhaps the next time I have a problem of some kind I shall consult it.

I've had a series of excellent cello lessons with small but significant breakthroughs like that over the past couple of weeks. Of course, there was also that monthly group cello lesson where we worked on ensemble pieces for the upcoming recital. For some reason I couldn't get comfortable with the length of my endpin or the angle of my cello. I blew stupidly easy shifts while playing solo (naturally). Moral of the story: Revisit your ensemble pieces regularly, even if the last time you played them they were easy and note-perfect. I am appropriately humbled.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
~

Spring Concert Review

Fabulous weekend!

I freely and cheerfully admit that I was completely and utterly wrong about the quality of performance at this concert. It was a most excellent evening -- it blew us all away, musicians and audience alike. This conductor really knew her stuff; she trusted us more than we trusted ourselves. And what astounds me is that she didn't know us, beyond observing a rehearsal or two previous to her turn at bat. We pulled it off, thanks to her, to her faith and her leadership and her solid preparation. In the end, this was not in fact the concert to miss if you had to miss one, as most of my regular concertgoers ended up having to do thanks to other responsibilities.

There were over a hundred people in the audience, which was wonderful too. I'm glad so many people got to experience it. My deepest thanks go out to MLG, HRH, and the boy, who were my own personal cheering section in the back corner. I saw the boy standing on his seat to applaud wildly after the first half of the programme, which made me grin so hard I thought I'd strain a muscle. And on the way home he was singing to himself in the back seat. We asked him what he was singing and he said, "I don't know." We listened closely and realised that he was singing the bell theme from the Carillon at the end of the L'Arlesienne suite. My heart just about burst. I was extremely proud of him and of how he behaved.

The only mishap on the part of the celli (and the biggest musical mishap concert-wide, I think) was that we completely and utterly missed our cue for the celli treble clef solo in the middle part of the Carillon. We were counting, and then we heard the oboe playing, and I thought, Hmm, I don't remember the oboe playing here. And then the principal and I suddenly looked at one another out of the corner of our eyes, because we realised that we'd missed our entrance. It would have sounded awful if we'd jumped in, so we all let the oboe have a lovely solo. Who knew they played the same line we did? The conductor laughed about it once we were done, as did all of the celli. No harm done, but terribly amusing after weeks and weeks of work on that line and hitting the entrance every time. I think this version was nicer anyway; much gentler and more nostalgic. (Ha!)

I will be very interested in hearing any recordings made of this concert.

I had a group cello lesson Sunday afternoon, at which some of us incredulously dissected the previous night's successful concert before settling into the group pieces. It's nice to have all the heavy orchestral stuff behind me so that I can focus on lesson and recital work now. We got the final lineup for the recital and the official assignment of who's playing what part in the trios and quartets, and my duo partner and I are making plans to meet to rehearse our piece. I love our group lessons, although I suspect we tax our teacher's patience when we all get together and there's variously missing music and giggling and rhythm issues.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
~

Music At Home

Yesterday afternoon was my monthly group cello lesson, which was so much fun. I love the group lessons as a rule, but this one was particularly enjoyable. Only four out of seven students were there, and we played some really fun stuff which I essentially sight-read because I hadn't had time to play it through after my teacher gave it to me last Tuesday (last week = work + workshop insanity + brain burnout). I and my stand partner spent a lot of time laughing, which felt moderately wicked. I pulled some very nice stuff off when the less-confident people dropped out along the way, and tripped myself in a couple of particular places every single time because I hadn't prepared the shifts.

Last night after the boy got ready for bed I set up my cello and told him a little story about a moonlit barnyard at midnight, when the barn door creaks open and two eyes peek out, and then a little chicken steps into the barnyard to move one foot, then another, and then... dances! At this point I played the Chicken Reel for him, and he kept telling the story on his own. It was fun. When he was in bed I kept working on some of those nasty shifts and working out fingerings for various other group pieces, and he sang along in the dark. This morning he woke up singing again, and when I went in to cuddle him he threw his arms around me and asked if I'd had fun at my cello practise. I told him I had, and asked if he liked hearing it while he was in bed. He said he did quite enthusiastically and asked what songs they had been (which resulted in a discussion about Dona Nobis Pacem and Ave Verum Corpus at much-too-early-o'clock), so maybe I'll do it more often. Being comfortable enough to play with everyone at home here and upstairs was a definite indicator of how good a mood I was in. I actually liked the sound I was producing, too. Wonders will never cease.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
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More Musings on 7/8 Cello No. 7

Yeah, I know, I tend to go on about this. It's a big thing in my life, and this journal is mainly for my records, after all.

I mentioned the slice in the table to my teacher at the ensemble lesson on Sunday and her eyes got very big. She looked at it and said, "Do you have a digital camera? Take a picture and send it to them, and ask them what they're prepared to do about it, and if they'll guarantee the work. This kind of thing can really affect resale value." I wonder if they might end up dropping the price a bit because of it. Because damn it, I like the sound of this one. I've already seen that four different examples of this model sound completely different; it's not like they can just order another one in for me.

Also, the more I think about this, the less willing I am to make an absolute decision one way or another in this brief space of time. Renting had occurred to me months ago when I was trying the Jay Haides in Toronto, but my mother reminded me of it yesterday. I know my local luthier rents student kits; there's probably no reason why they wouldn't rent this student cello to me for a few months, in order for me to get a better sense of how the size is going to affect my playing. Not all my rental fee will go toward the purchase, of course, but most of it will, and if I don't buy this one then I have a credit for whatever I do end up buying, be it cello or bow.

We got new music in the ensemble class yesterday: The Beatles' 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' arranged for trio (so much fun for the middle voice because there's that rhythm but you're not playing the melody you expect), 'Dona Nobis Pacem' as a canon, 'Ave Verum Corpus' (which I could not get in tune; the 7/8 felt like it was sitting funny, as if I was torqued, but no matter how I adjusted I couldn't shake it, and of course I was playing the top voice which goes stratospheric), a really fun blend of two popular tunes done tango-style, and a kids' song (we get to accompany the littles, and it's going to be hilarious). There will be more, no doubt. And I learned that my friend from orchestra, who also began studying with our principal cellist about a month before I did (and who also plays a 7/8), is playing the other part of the Lee duet with me, which is going to be lovely.

Back to work.

~
* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
~

Recital Countdown

In the space of thirteen hours I have had two cello lessons, one private on Friday night and one group dress rehearsal this morning at nine. The world is very clear, bright, and cold today, but there's not much wind and so it's lovely. The snow removal crews came along and took away the piles of snow in the street, and driving was actually a pleasure this morning as compared to the hell it has been for the past two days. (Way, way too much time spent in cars in traffic Thursday and Friday. Noting makes me crazier than leaving twice the amount of time it usually takes to get somewhere to account for weather and traffic, and still arriving late.)

Anywhat. Happy thoughts. Cello!

I lugged the 7/8 to my lesson last night along with my own cello, and my teacher played them for me so I could hear them. There's no contest, no comparison. My full size sounds so much better: It's clearer, it rings, there's precision and just plain beautiful sound. The 7/8 was stuffy and dull. This just isn't the one. I was somewhat worried about this. It's going to take a lot to find a 7/8 that has the kind of sound my current instrument does. Anyway, it's not pressing; it can go back to the luthier and I can forget about it until they get another one.

(Also noted when my teacher switched between the 7/8 and my current cello: My cello is HUGE! Yes, yes, I knew this, but I'm usually sitting behind it and I'm used to it. Seeing it in someone' else's hands was an eye-opener.)

So yes, last night's lesson was great. I'm really happy with how my sound is developing after only two months of lessons. I can hear my intonation has improved, and the improvement in sound production that comes from better bow handling and control, too. There's a lot of confidence being developed as well, which doesn't hurt. I came home feeling terrific, which was very welcome after the day I'd had. (An hour on a bus to cover what usually takes fifteen minutes. Yeah. And then late to pick up the boy, late to make dinner, late out the door to the lesson thanks to the original lateitude plus traffic. It was very, very bad. Especially after the previous day's trip to the doctor for the boy's checkup, which took three times as long as it should have to get there and even longer to get home again.)

This morning the light was incredible, what with the sky being clear and so much snow off which for the sun to reflect. And although I didn't sleep very deeply or steadily I woke up in a good mood thanks to the lesson, and looking forward to the morning group lesson. I love the group lessons to begin with, but I'm really enjoying the program we're doing for tomorrow's concert. It's fun to play with the others, and they're a terrific set of people. Some are older than I am, some are around my age, and others are in their teens. We have the two darling little girls, too, who are so serious when they play; they concentrate so hard and yet they stay relaxed. I adore watching them. My teacher played her piece at our insistence, too (if we had to play our solos and duets, then she had to as well!) and we loved it. It's Fauré's "Elegie", and believe it or not I've never been in the room when an accomplished cellist has played something passionate like that. It was incredibly moving.

Afterwards we had our coffee and nibbly things and the kids played Christmas carols on the piano for fun, and it was just so lovely. Having a small group with a defined coach is so much easier than a small group trying to self-direct. And we all support one another and know exactly what everyone's going through or trying to work past.

Something I really want to work on in the new year is advancing my musical interpretation and expression. It feels odd to have been playing the cello for fifteen years, yet be so behind on, well, sounding good (in a different way from being technically correct). Even when I tell myself that I haven't had a lesson in ten years, my brain seems to think that because I've been playing in the meantime I should sound a heck of a lot better than I do. Today the tiniest girl, who is sitting in front of me for the concert, kept turning her head and watching me with wide eyes when I played the "Adeste Fideles" trio, which was nice. Being looked up to soothes both the logical and illogical parts of my brain.

I am looking forward to the recital. I'm still marvelling at the fact. I'm slightly concerned about the boy, who has been off the past couple of days and who will be attending the concert instead of napping, but que sera sera. And it will all be over too quickly.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
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Resigned

I've just written, translated, and sent off the regretful decline of the reconstruction quote for the Mystery Cello. I've been putting it off because I haven't wanted to formally call an end (albeit temporary) to the dream. But it's been a month (not that I intended to let it languish that long in my inbox, dear god, where did November go? scratch that, where did 2008 go?) and it's irresponsible to let the affair drag on any longer.

So I wrote a thank you and and an explanation of why we had to wait, and reinitialized my search for a 7/8. I should put my 4/4 up for sale as well to free up more money, but I'm enjoying the sound it makes in my lessons and I'm clingy when it comes to things like big resonant instruments that have been my companion for fifteen years. My teacher has assured me that if it sells before I've found a new one I can use the cello she still has from before she bought the beautiful one she uses now, which is lovely and mind-boggling but somehow I doubt I'll be caught without one. I see the same celli up for sale online all the time. I also have no idea what to ask price-wise for the one I've got. I'll talk to the luthier when I'm next in. I just wish I didn't feel like I'd killed something heartlessly.

Anyway, I am consoling myself with, and actually beginning to revive my interest in, trying 7/8s again. In the meantime my teacher has somehow suckered me into playing a solo at the Christmas recital in three weeks. I suspect I agreed because she proposed it so nicely (in the "possessing, marked by, or demanding great or excessive precision and delicacy" definition) and didn't make me feel like I was being railroaded into it. What I wanted to ask, but didn't because I am shy and despite the fact I've played with her for seven years I've only been her student for a month, was who else was soloing and what were they playing. Because I'm doing a Bach minuet, and part of me is relieved because I played these things thirteen years ago, and another part is mildly squirmy because they're in the Suzuki level 2 book, for heaven's sake. I was playing sonatas before I stopped lessons before. Mind you I've lost a hell of a lot of decent sound production and technique since then, so these are reacquainting me with the basics, but still. Not that the people in the senior's residence will care. They will be too busy being charmed by the six year old playing Suzuki book 1 pieces on her tiny cello .

Speaking of the six year old, my teacher told me yesterday that her next-door neighbour has a four year old who is obsessed with music and wants lessons. Generally the idea about children and lessons is not to bother until they can read (something about their ability to organize the info they take in, and I suspect so as not to utterly crush the joy they have in spontaneous music) but she knows that Sparky is also excited about the idea of music lessons, so he can play the cello like Mama does. So she has proposed that the two boys come to the group lesson on Sunday to see what it's like. Our group lesson is divided into two halves, the younger students for the first hour, then a short social thing, and then the adults have an hour of group lesson. The boys would observe the younger group lesson, and if they are still as excited about things she'd think about maybe having a special series for them to learn about rhythm and other pre-formal lesson skills. She mentioned that the McGill Conservatory has a Very Little Musicians program that might do as well.

I told Liam about this Very Special Invitation last night and he was very excited. His first question was, of course, "What's the little boy's name?" "I didn't ask," I said. "I forgot that it would be important to you. I'll ask when I see my teacher tomorrow at dress rehearsal." So he went around for the rest of the evening telling his father and the cats that he and 'the little boy' would be watching a cello lesson. We'll have to talk about proper etiquette and such tomorrow, both for the concert and the lesson the next day. The tentative plan for Sunday is to explain why he needs a slightly early nap and for HRH and I to bring him to the young group lesson, after which the boys can take off to the Thomas layout bookstore while I have my adult group lesson. If he's unbearable after having attended the concert Saturday night we can call it off, and there's always the option of HRH whisking him away from the lesson if he can't sit quietly.

I looked at the calendar yesterday and realised that there was a Wednesday rehearsal, my lesson on Thursday, a dress rehearsal tonight, the concert on Saturday, and the group lesson on Sunday. Good grief. I'm also mildly freaked out about the amount of work that has to happen between now and Wednesday, because I'm teaching a real-live university class on Monday morning (subject: Neo-paganism, and I have an eight-page lecture outline and the dreadful feeling that I'm going to demonstrate an Epic Fail by somehow being unprepared... I always feel like there's no good way to make the info flow logically) and have a coffee/lunch date on Tuesday and an assignment due for the evaluations Wednesday which is only about 30K words but revolves around examples drawn from Biblical stories and quotations so I'm going to be flipping through a Bible as I do it, which will slow things down.

Back to the cello stuff. I'm liking the sound that I'm (sometimes) producing in my lessons. It's a bit of a juggling act because I have to remember things about my bow hand, my right elbow, my shoulders, the left wrist and elbow that we've been working on, and then all the usual technical music stuff too. But there was a point in yesterday's lesson where I sounded good, and where I could hear and feel the vibration of the bow across the string in all the right ways. It feels sometimes like I'm not grasping very basic things, but things are improving in general at orchestra thanks to the new awareness I have of my body and how it moves, so there's hope.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
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First Lesson In Ten Years

On Sunday after lunch I headed out for a baby shower forty-five minutes away, which was lovely, but which I had to leave early because I had my first cello lesson with my new teacher to attend. I wore my funky red shoes for confidence at the lesson, and a pair of new pants I'd just hemmed. I mistimed the travel (stupid bridge work one way but not the other) and halfway there I realized that I'd be half an hour early if I went straight to the lesson, so I stopped at the needlework shop to buy the needles I needed for my next knitting project. (Note: 'Next' implies I've ever finished one. I have failed miserably at every knitting project I've ever tried. But I have begun a new one [armwarmers for me] and have decided to heroically attempt a hat for the newly hairless Mousme.) I went from the needlework shop to my lesson and was ten minutes early anyway. Sigh. I made a critical decision and unpicked the new hems on my pants with my Swiss army knife. When someone else showed up for the group lesson I unloaded the cello and walked into my teacher's house behind her.

It was odd: I was both nervous and not about this lesson. My first lesson with the new teacher was supposed to be a private one last Thursday, but last week was a disaster of sick people and forcing four days of work into the only two I ended up having free to work, so it didn't happen. Instead, the once-a-month group lesson ended up being my first. I am, as I repeatedly point out yet people seem to disbelieve because I do an impressive job pretending otherwise, extremely shy, so walking into an established social group of ten people was daunting. What's the etiquette? Where do I put my stuff? Did I take someone's parking spot? Am I sitting in someone's customary seat? At the same time, I knew my teacher and one other student, having played with them in the orchestra for seven and three years respectively, so I had something of a lifeline. (The other student and fellow orchestra member was pretty new as well, as her other teacher had only recently stopped teaching; I don't know if she'd done a group lesson yet or not. I believe she had, but it might have been only one.) The little coffee break between the youngest cellists' lesson and the group lesson was the most awkward, so awkward for me that I took a cup of coffee to have something to do with my hands. (I am not a coffee drinker; it usually doesn't agree with me. However, it was really, really good coffee, which was nice.) Eventually we settled and our teacher put us in various places around the room, we tuned, and started playing.

This is the point where I actually relaxed. I know, I know; normally I'd be tense about playing in a small group with people I don't know. But somewhere a couple of minutes in, I realised that I didn't suck. I am used to expecting to be/actually being of a lower technical proficiency than others. Here I was at par with, or even more confident than, others in the group. The beginning was rocky because I was having trouble hearing my intonation, but then something clicked and then it was all okay. There was the disaster of misplacing my hand badly when I had to go really high up while sight-reading an arrangement of Satie's 'Gymnopedie', but hey, sight-reading for fun; no harm, no foul. (Lovely, lovely pieces in that Cellobrations collection for cello quartet, I hope we play lots of them in the future.) I enjoyed it all so much that I played one of the new pieces I was given at the lesson when I got home while the boy was in the bath ( "Is Mama playing her cello for me? While I'm in the bath?" followed by appreciative applause when I'd done), and after I'd put him to bed I sat down for another hour and really worked on bowings and phrasing for 'Itsumo Nando Demo,' the song Sandman7 and I are working on. It took me the whole hour to play bits with different bowings, make a decision one way or the other, and put slurs and bowings in for the entire piece to get it to where I was happy with the phrasing. Next comes recording it while I play it in this version and listening to it to see if it actually works from an audience POV.

Also, my teacher showed us the most adorable Twinkle bow, a fully functional miniature bow used to teach children how to hold it correctly and to use the proper wrist and elbow motions. Because it's so tiny you can't help but hold it properly in order to get the maximum yield from the hair. We squealed when we saw it.

It was a great introduction to the group and to working with the new teacher. I'm looking forward to the next group lesson, which is in a month's time. After that there's a December dress rehearsal and then a performance at a group home.

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* The original post at Owls' Court
* Owls' Court: the main journal
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