Cello update

Nothing new for ages, then the piano/cello notes to Arvo Pärt’s “Spiegel im Spiegel” arrive in the mail and I have met with a woman looking for someone to play cello duets with.

On the former: the notes look insane. They look like something I would see in a nightmare about playing and/or composing a piece, but not because they are complicated. On the contrary, because they are so simple. Simple, minimalistic piano, even simpler cello.  And behind that simplicity lies the devil, of course, or god, or both, or god when he’s drunk, or angels. We’ll find out. Go watch it on youtube. I am trying to get Beta to play it with me on harp, and also trying to get Gamma to fire up her piano and play it with me as well. First I have to learn the cello part. And get the piano tuned.

On the latter: she came over to my house last night and we tried a few pieces. I expected it to be awful and frustrating, since learning to play a duet is an order of magnitude harder than just learning a piece, and we didn’t know the pieces we were trying to play. But it was considerably less awful and frustrating than I had expected, which I expected, being an experienced pessimist and low-baller. So all is well. I am curious whether she will want to continue. I hope so. Probably. I do. As she left, she’s like all, do you play any other instruments?

And I’m like all, should I? And I’m like, saw, theremin and tin whistle, but not super-good or anything.

And she’s like, blink.

And I’m like, you know, singing saw? And I start explaining the theremin, with which she was perhaps not familiar, and offer to show it to her next time.

If there is a next time.

Who know?

We’ll see, won’t we?

3 responses to “Cello update

  1. Buttonhole

    Man, that is one GREAT piece of music. Wish you’d post it when you have it “done.”

  2. Hey, Mig. I am browsing through old posts to find the artist friend of yours whose work you once promoted, because I can’t find a search function and it’s fun to browse anyway. Anyway I found this post on “Spiegel im Spiegel” which was the basis for the only ballet I’ve ever enjoyed: Dracula. Thought I’d recommend it. (What a beautiful, haunting piece of music. It was my first exposure to Arvo Part-mit-umlaut.)

    https://www.balletmet.org/backstage/ballet-notes/157#anchor1323622

    http://deardominik.typepad.com/dear_dominik/2008/10/dracula-the-ballet.html

  3. mig

    Isn’t Part-with-umlaut fine?
    Thanks for the links.
    Dunno what happened to my search function, will try to figure that out.