It is so nice to be home. I even got to cancel this week's trip to the Bay Area so I'm home for the whole week! I got home Sunday afternoon around 4pm after being in transit since 6pm Saturday (that's when I left for the airport in Barcelona). I tried to play the cello when I got home but after days of very little sleep I really had a hard time playing and finally just gave up.
Yesterday and today were better. I had orchestra rehearsal last night and while I felt fine for most of rehearsal it was tough going to stay alert towards the end of rehearsal. With the time change it was as if I had been up all night. We played through Carol of the Bells, some of the Nutcraker Suite, the Karelia Suite, and the Capriol Suite, mostly the fast movements of the suites to work on speed and dynamics.
Today I got to practice and I started working on Popper's Requiem - I'm playing the 3rd cello part. I still don't know when we're going to perform it but I hope I have my new cello when we do! I spent time listening and then playing the Sarabande - both the du Pre and the Casals recordings that I have. I had to fight the urge to play it the way I wanted to - will have to do that later.
Trying to emulate duPre and Casals reminded me of the Picasso museum I visited in Barcelona. I didn't know that Picasso lived in Barcelona, and in fact, started art school there before finishing his formal studies in Madrid. The museum focused on his early work, and had many drawings and paintings that he did as a young art student. I didn't realize how good he was at the basics of human form, landscape, portraits, etc.; his talent and skill were evident from a very early age. Many of his student works were copies of great paintings. It made me think about how art students learn the basics of their craft by copying the masters. As I walked through the museum I kept thinking about how I could see him becoming Picasso, and for the first time I could see in his art the evidence of his training and his mastery of the fundamentals in his later works. As I tried to play in a similar style as Casals and duPre I kept thinking that I was doing the same thing - trying to learn how to play the cello by copying the masters, and that it would help me become more of myself playing as I master the fundamentals of playing this beautiful but difficult instrument.
4 comments:
I like that thought! Emulation leads to individual interpretation and self! Sigh! Doesn't stop it all being hard though!
One of my orchestra's is performing the Karelia Suite on Friday night! It's so tough! All those nasty demi-semi-quavers! Bob the conductor has three of us, rather than all 10 or so cellos, playing the semi quaver scales during the ballade! even with three of us it's hard to keep in time! Ah the challenges : )
B
It's a great way to look at it. By copying the masters, you are learning the control it takes to intentionally play something a certain way. You're right CelloGal, not easy!
When I took art lessons a few years ago, I copied the teacher's style, even though you are not supposed to do that (you're supposed to express yourself). But it is very helpful, I think, to copy in order to learn different types of expression, to figure out who you are. Copying or emulating the great masters in art and/or music can only help. I wish I were at the point where I could copy du Pre or Casals!
It sounds like you are having a great time with this!
Thanks for the comments, everyone! It has been hard but very illuminating to try to play like the masters - however poor my imitation is.
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