On Enjoying a stellar Performance

I’ve been away from playing the cello for a few months (a gardening injury to my left hand left me with tendonitis and the need to rest my hand), so it was a joy to get a birthday present from my husband of tickets to a concert in New Bedford featuring Carter Brey playing the Schumann Cello Concerto with the New Bedford Symphony.  Additionally, a friend of ours (who is the official photographer of the orchestra) told us we definitely should attend the preconcert talk which the conductor, David Mackenzie, provides before each concert.  And, since Mackenzie, a suburb conductor, is leaving for Hawaii after this season, this was a chance to see another of his performances.

Carter Brey playing the Schumann Concerto with David Mackenzie conducting

I’ve been to a lot of concert evenings, but this ranks right up there as one of the most special.  Carter Brey came to the preconcert discussion with Conductor Mackenzie.  After David Mackenzie discussed the Britten sea pieces and Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition”, Carter Brey talked about Schumann, and said more about the concerto we were about to hear.  He brought out his cello (he talked about it’s history and how he came to own it) and played some excerpts that we should listen for.  He was even gracious enough to allow our friend to take a photo of me with him.  What a nice person!

Preconcert Talk: David and Carter discussing the concert

Carter discussing his cello

 

Carter Brey’s Cello

 

The concert was stellar.  I provided a link below to a review from one of the local papers.  Brey’s playing of the Schumann was wonderful: beautiful, sonorous, emotional. (I wish my cello sounded like that!) In the preconcert talk Brey mentioned that he played this concerto for the first time in Washington, DC with Rostropovich conducting.  Someone mentioned to me that Rostropovich thought that Brey’s playing of Schumann was among the best.  I certainly thought so after hearing the performance.  At the end of his performance he hugged all the principals (he clearly had wonderful rapport with the orchestra), and then for the last piece on the program he drew up a chair at the back of the cello section and played with the orchestra (something I’ve also seen Yo-Yo Ma do).  It’s so inspiring to see this kind of love of music making.  To Mackenzie’s and the orchestra’s credit, the Mussorgsky was one of the best performances I’ve heard of that piece; it was filled with energy and dynamics and came to such a rousing conclusion that it brought the hall to it’s feet.  Such a memorable and inspiring evening!  Thank you Carter Brey and thank you to the New Bedford Symphony, a wonderful local orchestra filled with talent.

Review: NBSO offers evening of education, exultation

 

Some Updates

String Ensemble is finished for the fall.  Meetings were rather sporadic (our coach was away and then ill) and we never worked up a full program for a concert.  The group was very small this fall, actually too small for two cellos and a bass (only three violins and 1 viola), so I’m going to drop out for the winter.  Doesn’t make sense to have the director always saying to the cellos, please play more softly, you are too loud, when we are barely touching the strings!

We did do a partial program at the Christmas Concert at the conservatory, so at least we did work up a few pieces for performance, which was good.

The cello choir finally got organized toward the end of the fall session. Several people have dropped out already, so I’m not at all sure that it will continue.  The selected pieces are way easy and I’ve been playing 4th cello; this is awful on my 7/8 cello, which has terrible wolfs on the C string where most of the playing happens for those parts.  And the parts are so easy, that it’s hard to take them seriously and practice!!!  So I guess I’m back to no ensemble playing for the foreseeable future!

I have started working again on the Bach Suites.  I’m also back to working on some Popper etudes and want to go back and work again on pieces that I’ve learned previously.  I’ve spent far too much of my time this fall on ensemble pieces that I’ve just not enjoyed.

Cello Choir is a ‘Go’

I found out last night at String Ensemble that we have enough cellists for the new Conservatory Cello Choir to start.  We have six people, everyone is a fairly experienced cellist so that should mean that we will have great fun together.  First practice is on November 6th.  Looking forward to it!

I also note that the Boston Cello Quartet is now offering a cello choir course at the Boston Conservatory!  Cello Choirs must be the new ‘in thing’.  🙂

 

Cello Choir?

The conductor of our string ensemble (who is a cellist) is thinking of starting a cello choir at the Conservatory.  A fantastic idea,  I think, because the Cape seems to have an abundance of cellists who enjoy playing and like playing in groups.

So far there are at least 5 cellists interested, maybe more.  If this works out, I will be playing in two string groups this fall (the string ensemble and the cello choir).  I’m looking forward to that; my biggest enjoyment from playing the cello is playing in groups with others.  I love the sound of the harmonies, particularly when we get the tuning right! I have my fingers crossed that this works out.

The string ensemble music this fall is much easier than previous years; our conductor wants to focus on intonation and musicality and has picked pieces that we can learn well quickly so that we can really work on intonation and performance.  So far, it’s been good.

Ensemble practicing

The Bulletproof Musician has an interesting post this week on his blog: “Rehearse to practice or practice to rehearse”.  It’s about being well prepared for ensemble practices. It really spoke to me, because so often I think of ensemble meetings as “practices” and go thinking I will learn my parts as I practice them with the ensemble.  I do go over my parts during the week.  But I’ve never spent nearly as much time learning my ensemble parts as I have on pieces I am preparing for lessons.

This post really suggests a better way!  If one goes to an ensemble practice with one’s parts fully prepared, then the ensemble “rehearsal” becomes a time when you can truly focus on playing with others, listening to the other parts, adjusting intonation so it fits with the other musicians.  You can work on dynamics, watch the conductor and follow him, watch and interact with the other players, really work on playing the pieces, not work on learning the parts.  I agree with everything that was said in this article, and I’m hoping to live up to those ideals in my preparation when ensemble begins for the fall next week.

Rehearse to practice or practice to rehearse

 

Tchaikovsky Competition

I watched both the cello and piano sections of the Tchaikovsky Competition from Russia this year.  It was interesting listening to a lot of excellent musicians and learning how the preferences of the judges were different from my own.  I did read a lot of comments, and there was discussion of how, in the cello competition, if you weren’t there there were things you missed including volume of the music and projection (just not noticeable listening to the performances through the microphone).  It did seem as if the judges liked modern Russian pieces a lot!

In the piano competition I thought George Li should have placed even higher. His expression and touch on the keys was amazing.

I did notice how few female entrants there were and how those that did compete did not do well in the competition. Here in the eastern US cello is very popular and there are lots and lots of female cellists.  The cello competition (and the others as well) seemed very male centered.  I did wonder about that.

The performances are available streaming on Medici TV for the next four years.  Supposed this was one of the most watched musical events all over the world in history.  Great music for sure!

http://tch15.medici.tv/en/

 

Teaching adults

Do read this article by Robert Battey, posted on the Internet Cello Society board.  He talks about teaching adult cello students and the differences he sees between teaching adult beginners and very young students.

I liked what he had to say about the limitations of the Suzuki approach for adults (how the approach used for young students may not serve adults nearly as well). He feels traditional lessons often do not prepare adult students for ensemble or community orchestra playing, a goal many adult students have.  He talks also about teaching students whose adult muscles and physiology require alternate approaches.

http://cellofun.yuku.com/topic/18961/Soso-article-for-cello-teachers-in-April-MdASTA-magazine#.VXSfqOtpeyM

 

Making up for lost time….

Going away for a vacation is rejuvenating, but being without my cello for a couple of weeks means working my way back up to speed on all the pieces I am working on.  I wondered if I would lose the memory on my Bach pieces, but I was able to play them through yesterday without too many lapses. Whew!

My fingers are a bit sore today; I think I probably lost some of the calluses on my fingertips (my thumb was fine).  My cello is sounding okay; I think it likes the higher humidity and the warmer temperatures now that spring has come to town.  But, it still will take a few days to sound played in.  It likes being played regularly!

I did take my music with me and played the pieces on a piano a few times to keep the music in my head.  I have the most awful time trying to play tenor clef music on the piano.  I have no trouble with bass and treble clefs (which of course if you play the piano you can read easily), but although I can play tenor clef on the cello with no problem, it’s a struggle on the piano.  I also spend some time diagraming the timing in the middle section of the Faure Elegy.  There are measures of 8th, 16th, and triplets that are very hard to play accurately.  I ended up writing 1xxx, 2xxx, 3xxx, 4xxx on the music so I could see clearly where the beats fell, and how long the rests were in the very fast sections.  I think it helped, as I was able to play it more easily yesterday.  Now I just have to memorize it!!!  And play it up to tempo!

We did get to a concert with a cello. It was all newly composed music (much of it was completely lacking melody and attractiveness), but the cellist was quite good.  I’m not a fan of much modern music, but I do keep trying to have an open mind about it and do keep listening.

Memorizing and the Musician’s Brain

I read a small report in this morning’s Wall Street Journal about memorizing music and it’s effects on the brain.  The small report was in response to a long article in the BBC Magazine called “How do you memorize an entire symphony?”, the article stimulated by the fact that the Aurora Orchestra will perform Beethoven’s Pastoral symphony without printed music at this summer’s BBC Proms.

The article is written by Jessica Grahn, a neuroscientist; she explores how musicians memorize, the parts of the brain that are involved in memorizing music, the difficulties involved and the relation of music memory to emotion. Of particular interest is her discussion of memory slips and the practice strategies that musicians use to either prevent or recover from them.  She also writes about famous musicians who were renowned for their ability to play from memory.  There is much to think about (and techniques to try) in the article that will help me with my memory work on the Bach Suites (and other pieces).

I thought this was a wonderful article, and I guess that you, my readers, will find it fascinating as well.  Thus, below, is a link to the article.  I definitely look forward to hearing the Aurora Orchestra play at this summer’s Proms!

How do you memorise a symphony?

The Aurora Orchestra at the 2014 Proms –  Photo by Mark Allan

Memorizing and Practice

I admit it, I have been resisting memorizing everything I work on.  The pressure is on from my teacher to work everything from memory (well, not everything: the Popper etudes I’m still working from the music); increasingly we are not using the music during lessons, just working on a piece without it.  Preparing for this takes an incredible amount of time and effort, and I do see that I am developing a more thorough understanding of the pieces.  However….

I, so far, with most pieces, have not gotten to the point where the memory is so solidly there that I can play with freedom and emotion.  With most of the pieces my brain is still focusing on the memory of what comes next: often the dynamics and emotion fall by the wayside.  I’ve created some tracks with piano accompaniments (using Finale), and trying to play along with these is a great test of how far I’ve come in my memory work and in playing with proper tempo and rhythm.  The Paradis “Sicilienne” at the end of Suzuki book 7 is a piece that I have been able to play comfortably from memory.  (And also, although not quite as competently, the Eccles and Popper pieces from the same book.)  Those have come more easily, I think, because they have very melodious singable phrases, and repeats of material (this makes the memorizing easier).

I’m learning the Faure “Elegy” from book 8 right now; I have most of the first page from memory and can play pretty comfortably along with a slow accompaniment.  The tricky rhythms and fast runs of the second half are much, much harder; here, I think, memorizing will help me to be able to play the piece well, but the memory is harder because the syncopated sections and the fast runs have so much more detail (and the piano part is so different!).  But the memory work is helpful.

Memory work on the pieces from the Bach Suites is much trickier and much more difficult to accomplish.  It is dense, complicated music with so much detail that it is hard to keep everything in memory well enough to play with musicality.  The Third Suite Bourees are okay; they are pretty melodic and have some helpful (!) repeating sections.  The Allemande has taken an incredible amount of time and I’m still not there in terms of playing it well.  I’ve just started learning the Sarabande; the double stops and complicated fingering will make this one another difficult one to learn and be able to play from memory.  I read somewhere this week that the longer it takes to memorize something, the longer it will stay in memory.  Hope that applies to the Bach Suites!!