Ray Lustig Gives TEDx Talk in New York

Renown composer and scientist who has achieved numerous accolades in each discipline, Ray Lustig, was invited to give a TEDx talk in New York on June 11, 2016. Lustig spoke about how barriers and limitations can actually be a great source of freedom and creativity. His music has been presented in venues ranging from New York City clubs and galleries to major concert halls and festivals around the world—from Le Poisson Rouge and Galapagos Art Space to Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and the École Normale in Paris. Also a highly respected researcher in moleclar biology, Lustig is fascinated by science, nature, and the mind. He has helped to co-found the Juilliard Weill Cornell Music and Medicine Initiative, a collaborative project that explores the many intersections of music, the sciences, the mind, and the healing arts.

Boston Musical Intelligencer: Ellipsis Trio Searches, Satisfies

Boston Musical Intelligencer
By David Patterson

Ellipsis Trio brought a Beethoven cello sonata, an Arthur Foote trio, and the premiere of a work written for Ellipsis by the late William Thomas McKinley to Killian Hall on the campus of MIT on Saturday night. My guess is that most at this inviting concert were probably not, if at all, familiar with the works programmed, never mind the music of local composer McKinley. That, in and of itself, could make for a satisfying musical outing.

That is only one of several reasons I have continued to follow this fairly new trio, which started up in early 2013. It was the summer of 2014 when first I encountered them—in a “refreshing and remarkable” excursion with Dvořák and Ravel.

Newness, if you will, went further still when the group moved to Killian, presumably in the hunt for a more welcoming venue. The living room size of the place appeared just right with the very nice turnout comfortably seated. The room’s acoustics also seemed suitable, allowing every note to be heard loud and clear. While sometimes the going got too loud, that was not particularly due to the room.

Another shift involved that of the pianist. Ellipsis followers had come to know Konstantinos Papadakis as the Trio’s pianist from the very outset. So it was a surprise last night to see Constantine Finehouse, who is becoming increasingly well-known to Boston audiences, at the Steinway concert grand for this outing.

A program note for Beethoven’s mature Sonata for Piano and Cello No. 4, in C Major Op. 102 No. 1 set us off in the right direction. Eftychia Papanikolaou, Associate Professor of Music at Bowling Green State University (Ohio), related a comment made by a contemporary of Beethoven about his late music: “It is so original that no one can understand it on first hearing.”

Five tempos compacted into two movements would indeed keep even today’s listener on the alert. Patrick Owen committed the lyrical and tender moments in both Andantes and the Adagio with touching sensitivity, at times with wisps of the bow, at times with a warm, vocalized-like vibrato. In the two Allegros, Finehouse found security in strongly pointed power sweeps and dominating accents. Overall, the two played more as strangers, the cellist phrasing one way, the pianist another. When they did match, ears lit up.

Such a joy it was next to meet up live with Trio No. 2 in B-flat Major from Boston Second School composer Arthur Foote. I came to this piece with the same sense as Papanikolaou, who wrote that this Trio would “recall a French ethos representative of Gabriel Faure’s chamber music.” With Ellipsis, French-American ebullience shot through the score as shooting stars intermittently flash through a pellucid sky.

Amanda Wang’s violin looked upon Foote’s loveable melodicism with exact remove coupled with delectable tone, truly a high spot of the evening.

As to the bigger picture, ebullience would drift into loudness, volume overtaking feeling. Or, those moments might be described as resolute, that early German influence on Foote coming to the fore.

Patrick Owen took to a few words in introducing William Thomas McKinley’s Trio for Violin, Cello and Piano in 5 movements. When Owen arrived to give McKinley a ride, the composer got in the car and “dumped the score in my lap, saying, ‘This is for you’.”

McKinley’s approach involved highly attractive opening moves acting as “ritornellos” that in turn provided grounding for an array of intervening tangents, often emulating jazz and blues.

Ellipsis showered the 36-minute richly eclectic work with un-diluted devotion, heaping lifeblood through and through upon the mysterious atmospheres of “distant land,” the off accents of “here’s the beat,” the hushed piano oscillations with suspended strings in “silk,” the dance allusions in “Tango Sonata,” and in-a-hurry rhythms of a metropolis in “Downtown Walk.”

Ellipsis’s world premiere of the work completed just before McKinley’s death in 2015 stopped the show, drawing sincere reaction from the intent listeners from enthusiastic applause to random vocalizations of approval.

Strings Magazine: Benoît Rolland on the Making of Bows 1500 and 1515

Strings Magazine

Award-winning, Parisian-born bow maker Benoît Rolland studied both piano and violin, graduating from the Paris and Versailles conservatoires. He trained as a bow maker in Mirecourt, France, (1971–75) with master maker Bernard Ouchard, and opened his first studio in Paris in 1976. His bows have been played by Yehudi Menuhin, Mstislav Rostropovich, Yo-Yo Ma, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Kim Kashkashian, Lisa Batiashvili, and many other professional musicians. He moved permanently to Boston in 2001, and was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2012.

Rolland’s career is multifaceted: traditional bow making entwined with contemporary art, innovation, and education. In 2016 he is drafting an educational initiative called the Heritage Project. With it, Rolland aims to communicate his bow-making knowledge and celebrate the heritage of the French School of bow making, while also supporting continued innovation.

Rolland penned this feature to commemorate the making of his 1,500th and 1,515th signed bows. The process, though exacting, is revealed to be as much poetry as it is motion.

December 2014

I am about to make my 1,500th signed bow. This is a moving moment, after 45 years making bows nearly every day. I’ve built 1,850 pieces actually, starting with 350 bows for apprenticeship. And I’ve tested 20,000 bows over the years. As numbers grow, so does my fascination with performing music—its complexity, and the commitment and energy it demands.

I postpone the making of Bow 1500. The time is not right; I am absorbed by the commissioned list and wish to reserve a special moment for this artwork, dedicated to musicians.

May 2015

I reach Bow 1515, which I skip—along with 1500. The two bows will be twinned, and I intensify my work at the bench to reach the point where the hand flows with intention while the mind navigates between music and bow making.

Summer and Fall 2015

Moving to a new studio. It’s flooded by a particular incidence of the Northern light that I have been looking for since Mirecourt. The first bow I make here is for violinist Leonidas Kavakos.

The concept for 1500/1515 is taking shape. I am obsessed with it, but shall wait some more as I concentrate on the next bow, for Yo-Yo Ma. Designing bows that respond to musicians’ complex intentions pushed my understanding far beyond my perception as a violinist. How should lifelong listening crystallize in two bows? It will be a joy to try pieces in my stock that I have, until now, refrained from using: Fine woods are natural wonders that invite respect and restraint.

November 13, 2015

A tragic link in the long chain of violence around the world, the attack of the Bataclan in Paris targets a popular music venue in existence since 1865. Violence is never acceptable, and I have stood against it since early in my life. I feel that each of us can act toward a more peaceful and just world.

I decide to give Bow 1515 to Community Music Works, a committed nonprofit that brings string music to young people living in severely disadvantaged contexts. Perseverance, artistic dedication, and sharing music link our paths. Bow 1515, like bow 1500, will be gold mounted with conflict-free diamonds and a novel inlay. Community Music Works will sell this bow to a musician or a patron willing to support its work. Then, in its owner’s hand or care, the bow will move on to be played on professional stages. So the bow can mark a continuity between children discovering music in unlikely contexts and the finest soloists. Music offers the chance of a link.

December 2015

I choose the various materials and a piece of pernambuco with rich sound potential for Bow 1500. In 1984, I was attracted by its volume, density, and weight in the hand, and I cut slightly curved “blanks” in the 80-year-old plank. Pliant, resilient, this wood has a sensual presence; it sounds under the lightest touch, gives a clear G note to a finger tap. Rubbing and tapping give different kinds of information. I am curious to observe how these sounds will evolve as the bow shapes. Much is to be discovered as I go down to its core.

Early January 2016

A first shaving reveals a deep, dark orange. Under the plane, I seek how the vibration travels, identifying strong and weak points—like sight-reading a score. It is a wildly reactive wood: The bows should be thrilling to play, exuding a palette of overtones, but will be nerve-wracking to build. There is a risk that they may warp over the flame or even break in the course of the making. I memorize the wood patterns, constantly correlating playability and sound to ultimately obtain a warm, rich timbre and response to the lightest contact with the string.

Each few millimeters will have a slightly different profile. Making a lean, muscle-like bow requires taking risks. We love this emotion when the musician gets “under our skin”—in terms of carving bows, it means routinely working to a precision of 1/50th of a millimeter, leaving no point thicker than it really needs. At playing, I’d like a bow that the hand forgets.

The numerical data I record on bows represents but a fragment of the complexity of this object. Each new bow offers potential for multiple combinations that I must comprehend and order before touching the bench. Music accompanies this process, like Debussy’s Des pas sur la neige for Bow 1000. Preparing Bows 1500 and 1515, I increasingly listen to André Previn’s Song, alternating with Schubert’s Piano Sonata D960. They outline a quality of silence around them, a calm that guides the mind.

January–February 2016

Looking for a jewel quality to the frogs, I solicit my wife, painter Christine Arveil, for a design. I will hand-inlay gold parts that look like brush strokes, rather than resort to computerized technology. It will be challenging, given the hard ebony and the curved, hollowed frog. I build minuscule tools to carve the narrow grooves, and practice setting gemstones flush in gold, a technique that I find is quite difficult.

After a month exploring options, we adopt a design that I first execute over an ebony blade, noting a few minor changes. Next, I make an ebony-and-silver frog to further verify how lines and volumes play together. I later prepare the gold pieces. The calligraphic line with a diamond spark evokes a bow stroke. Christine has expressed the music dynamics while extending the black canvas of the frog to integrate ferrule and button.

February 26–29, 2016

I begin the rough out—the most physical phase in making a bow, and a decisive one: all that follows will be a perfecting of this base.

By segments of 30–45 minutes, uninterrupted fast movements define the shape. Between them, the progression is controlled visually and by muscular perception, flexing the stick with both hands.

Following the teachings of the French School, I don’t allow the bow to leave my hand, which is serving as a vice; the gesture is ample, never chipping the wood, never changing tools. I feel the evolution of the vibration through my body, and listen to the sound of the plane as I shave this particularly hard wood.

Adrenaline rush, focused energy: Every element that appears under the plane is analyzed in real-time against stores of memorized data. A good bow harmonizes contradictions (agile and athletic, yet soft and sensuous). A fast decision process selects, balances, and defines the multiple components of these opposites as wood is removed. There is no going back. Because I cut my blanks slim, no meaningless removal of wood should distract the attention: The rough-out will play on about 20 grams of wood dust.

Once Bow 1500 reaches a satisfactory profile, I go on reproducing the concept into 1515. I cannot simply repeat my work, because each piece of wood is different. I need to stay alert.

Early March 2016

I set aside 1515 and continue shaping 1500. A rewarding phase, where experience is delightful: The bow evolves toward playing. Shaping with a knife and a file alternates with cambering over a flame—actions that repeat themselves until the stick is homogeneous. It feels almost like modeling clay while I enhance the bow’s musical capacity. First octagonal, the shaft becomes round. With now only a few grams to play with, I must maintain a tightrope walker’s attention and move softly. The work spreads over several days to refresh control. The precision of the craftsmanship is focused on the musical outcome. Fortunately, the wood is flawless and takes the camber well.

It will not break and I can enjoy sculpting the head once the gold tip is in place. I look for balanced lines and an intimate harmony of angles and curves, somewhat daring.

Then, the light drastically shifts from unusually bright to grey, interfering with my sight. I pause on profiling the stick and move to crafting the metal pieces (ferrules, linings, eyelets, screws). For the gold parts, I use 18K strips that an old French goldsmith has prepared to my color specification. Forming the ebony and gold button, I slightly modify my usual proportions to complement the frog inlays.

Mid-March 2016

While I continue returning to the sticks with minute detailing, the work now centers on the frogs. The art design is reserved for the musician’s side, while a diamond eye and ring will face the audience.

With great emotion, I am looking at two exquisite ebony pieces, gifts from Bernard Ouchard that I dared not use yet. A magnificent black, the old wood is smooth and polishes in a whisper. It is very hard, too, and I launch into inlaying with nerves like rubber bands on a sling! I get both frogs fitted. The ensemble is complete with pearl slides from seashells that I had harvested and prepared while living on the French island of Bréhat.

Late-March 2016

With the frog adjusted, I can immerse myself in finishing Bow 1500. Setting the hair is a most important aspect of bow making. What follows is sanding, polishing, and fine tuning the camber—with each step repeated several times. I verify the bow’s unity and “evidence”—a French notion that hardly translates. I hope it will be easy to play, docile.

March 31, 2016

Today I sign bow 1500 and set the diamonds, sparks of light that we wish forever conflict-free. Keeping the continuity, I resume shaping Bow 1515. Again, the ancestral gestures will integrate sensation and experience, balancing emotion and technique in split seconds. Composing with and against the wood, with a sound in mind, is captivating, but in the end, the bow will be just a fluid conduit for the musician’s creative energy.

—

Benoît Rolland would like to acknowledge the generous and substantial assistance of his wife, Christine Arveil, in the writing of this journal.

Billboard: Meet Pablo Villegas, Global Ambassador of the Spanish Guitar

Billboard
By Judy Cantor-Navas

Pablo Villegas performs Thursday (June 2) at Brooklyn venue National Sawdust. After that, he’ll be part of a huge tribute to Placido Domingo at Madrid’s 80,000-capacity soccer stadium, presented by Champion League winners Real Madrid’s foundation. Then Villegas will be playing for children at the Vivanco Museum of Wine Culture in Spain’s La Rioja region, where he is from, before spending the summer on a symphony tour in Japan. Villegas will return to the U.S. in the fall for gigs at Princeton University and Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center.

You may not be familiar with Villegas, but, as witnessed by his schedule, it’s safe to call him a global ambassador of the Spanish guitar. A frequent classical orchestra soloist, the New York-based musician describes himself as “carrying his guitar on his shoulder and a suitcase in his hand;” sort of a rambling man in a tuxedo.

The guitarist delved into diverse genres of popular music from Latin America and the United States for his most recent album, Americano. The 2015 release debuted at No. 11 on Billboard’s Classical Crossover Chart.

We caught up with Villegas at a hotel in Panama City to talk about the guitar’s journey through the Americas, and his own quest “to present the guitar almost like a new instrument, starting with the sound.”

Despite the important history and beauty of classical guitar music, on a massive level it’s become a kind of background sound associated with “chillout” mixes. How have you proposed to take it – or take it back - to another level?

The guitar is an instrument that’s tied to a specific culture, Spanish culture. At the same time, it has became one of the most international, popular and versatile instruments in existence. It has that duality. Spanish guitar - classical guitar - and all of its repertoire is one of the most difficult and sophisticated, musically speaking. 

My intention is to present the guitar almost like a new instrument, starting with the sound. The guitar is an instrument that has not been considered a main player in an orchestra setting. I’m presenting it as a symphony instrument to play with an orchestra, without amplifying it. [I want to] project a big sound.

When I play a concert, people always say, ‘I never heard the guitar sound the way that you play it.’ And that is exactly what I am looking for. We’re talking about an emotional connection through the music using the guitar. For me, the guitar is the most wonderful and expressive instrument.

In addition to your classical concerts in which you play music by the great Spanish composer Joaquín Rodrigo and others, you’ve been exploring some more international and popular repertoire with songs you showcase on your album Americano. How did you come up with the concept?

It started when I met John Williams in Los Angeles. He invited me to his house because he had composed his first piece for solo guitar, and I was so fortunate that he asked me to perform the world premiere of the work (in 2012). Then I asked him if I could record it. From there, the seed of Americano was born. The guitar is tied to Spanish culture, [but] it is an instrument that belongs to the Americas as much as it does to Spain. Because once the guitar got to the Americas in the 16th and 17th centuries, it became the one through which all of the different regional identities in each country could be felt. There are dozens and dozens of rhythms that have their own identity. It was so exciting for me to explore what you can call the “American guitar.”

The tracks range from a Venezuelan joropo to an Argentine tango, to “Granada” by Mexican songwriter Agustín Lara and “Maria” from West Side Story. How did you choose?

I wanted to establish a context from which I could take a trip from the south to north, until I arrived in the United States, exploring the music of composers from different countries...I also wanted to transmit the vision of music as something that unites people. It’s a universal language, from American bluegrass to Brazilian bossa nova.

It was hard to decide what to include. I ended up leaving a lot of pieces out.

You’ve become well-established on the classical circuit and beyond [at age 38], but how did you begin your career?

I went onstage for the first time when I was seven years old. It was in a theater in my home town, Logroño, in front of an audience of family and friends. From that day on I wanted to play. My mother and I had the idea of performing at senior citizen residences on the weekends

The people in the audience are the ones who make sense of performing – and it’s the same whoever you are performing for. For me, it can be children I’ve played for through my work with my foundation (Música Sin Fronteras), or playing at Carnegie Hall. It’s the same thing.

The magic occurs with the music of the composer, the performer and the audience. That is the musical trinity. When it connects it’s something magical. It’s something we’ve all experienced at some point when we listen to music.

Tell me about your relationship with Vivanco, the celebrated winery in the La Rioja, the famous Spanish wine region where you grew up...

Vivanco has very close ties to art and culture. They have a foundation with a wine museum that UNESCO considers to be the most important one in the world dedicated to wine culture. We began this collaboration of support and sponsorship. It’s a natural relationship for me. Being from La Rioja, it’s easy for me to promote the culture of the region and its ties to wine and history. And there are a lot of receptions after my concerts...

Strings Artist Blog: Julian Schwarz: I Play the Cello. Should my Teacher?

Strings Artist Blog

In addition to the great lessons I have received from cellists throughout the course of my musical education, I have also been consistently challenged by players of other instruments. Growing up I had musicians at my disposal. I would play for my father [trumpet player and conductor Gerard Schwarz]. I would play for my mother. They would offer musical insight beyond my maturity. They would listen to my playing from a musical perspective, not a cellistic one. This would be incredibly frustrating.

My father would ask, “Why are you making that nuance?” I would reply that it was because of some technical consideration. He would not be satisfied with that reply. He would continue, explaining that if a certain technical consideration yields a musically uninspired result, then the technical consideration should be overcome another way. As a child who often spoke back, I would exclaim, “Dad, you just don’t get it.” I was unwilling to take on a huge technical burden for a seemingly minute musical improvement.

Boy, was I wrong.

As I matured, I started to realize that I was consistently challenged most often by non-cellists. Cellists would understand why I would not vibrate the note before a shift. They would understand why I made an unnatural crescendo to the frog. They would often show me the easy way to play a passage. As I grew, I started to see beyond these accommodations. Though it was nice to have someone listening to me that would accept some rocky intonation because he or she “knows how nasty the passage is,” I started to seek out those who wouldn’t accept it—those who wouldn’t understand.

Two violists come straight to mind. I had the great fortune to learn from two distinguished professors of viola during my time as a student. They began as chamber-music coaches. They were consistently demanding— to my great joy and admiration. I started to play for them alone. They would see and hear things I had not. They would ask me why I had made a musical decision, regardless of technique. Taking a lot of the technical considerations out of the equation was the absolute best learning experience I could have had. The lessons were about music, and only music.

Of course it is undeniable that a certain technical level should be achieved prior to taking lessons from teachers of other instruments, yet many of the technical advances one can make will only come to fruition if certain musical nuances are demanded. I remember many a time when one of my viola gurus would ask me to play a phrase a certain way. I would have trouble. That trouble would nudge my rear end to the practice room, where I would solve the technical issue that prohibited my expressivity. How incredible that I had that opportunity.

Though the two violists with whom I studied greatly inspired me musically and, as a result, technically, I did not stop there. I started to play for whoever would listen—but no cellists.

Conductors are a fantastic resource, as their musicianship is never (or should never be) confined to one instrument or one family of instruments. Pianists are also interesting, as they aim to create a large range of color on an instrument rather limited in this respect. Wind players and vocalists can educate string players about the sense of breathing that is inherent in all music.

There is also an important element of a teacher-student relationship one can omit by bringing music to teachers of other instruments: ego. Even though many teachers try to avoid direct competition with their students, there is an element of competition that is unavoidable if a teacher and student play the same instrument. Enough said. Playing for other instrumentalists will avoid this issue, or at least reduce its impact on the teaching itself.

Repertoire plays no part in this exploration. I would not bring only the Schumann Fantasy Pieces to a clarinetist (the fantasy pieces are clarinet works commonly played on the cello since Friedrich Greutzmacher made a transcription in the 19th century). Quite the contrary. I would not bring the Schumann Fantasy Pieces to a clarinetist because I would be looking for a musician’s take on my repertoire, therefore avoiding established traditions and opinions in my pursuit of musical integrity.

In the end, technique should never impede musical considerations—and without specific knowledge of a piece’s mechanics, a non-cellist will best judge your musicality. There is no such thing as a bowing that cannot be achieved on the cello, just players who don’t care enough to put in the extra effort. I have been asked often by cellists about one of my fingering or bowing choices that they consider unnecessarily difficult. Musical intention always comes before difficulty.

If it sounded the same I would do it the easy way, but it almost never does.

Read the original Strings posting here.

BBC Radio 3 In Tune: Anne Akiko Meyers Performs Live

Listen here to Anne Akiko Meyers who performed Arvo Pärt's "Spiegel im Spiegel' and Bach's "Air" from Orchestral Suite No.3 in D major on BBC Radio 3 In Tune and talked with Suzy Klein about her new recording, broken foot, and Vieuxtemps Guarneri. Her segment begins at 42:22.

Strings Artist Blog: Cellist Julian Schwarz on Destiny—Tied with a Bow

Strings Artist Blog

For a string player, a great instrument is only half the equipment battle. A phenomenal bow is the other half, providing finesse, tone, and various articulations. Bows are not only vital to phrasing and color, but sometimes suited to particular playing styles. Therefore it is common for an instrumentalist to own many bows to facilitate stylistic shifts. A bow collection is also much more affordable for string players than an instrument collection.

I find it interesting to try bows of various origins, weights, and styles, regardless of my intent to buy. This brings me to my story—one that starts with neither an intention to try, nor to buy, a bow.

One day I found myself at the Tarisio auction house in New York City (a premier auction house for stringed instruments and bows based in NYC and London) to return an instrument I had been trying that week. There was an auction only a few days away and the office was bustling with eager buyers. One such buyer was a Russian man who noticed me carrying a cello case. As I was making my way out he asked, “Are you a cellist?” I replied in the affirmative. He continued, “Would you consider helping me by trying the various cellos so I can hear how they sound?”

That afternoon I had neither appointments nor engagements, and I thought this exercise could be fun, not to mention a good deed!

So we went to a room and he brought me the first of many cellos to try. I sat down and realized an obvious obstacle—I had no bow! As I was just returning an instrument, I hadn’t bothered to bring one. As the auction had many cello bows as well as cellos, the gentleman agreed to fetch me a bow from the auction. He did so in haste—he was very considerate and appreciative of my aid and time. So I began.

As this was for his benefit, I played the same few excerpts on each cello, not aiming to draw conclusions myself. He took notes on each instrument’s unique sound, and asked for my thoughts occasionally. Turns out he was sent by another Russian man to examine the offerings of the auction. This other man was a collector, and relied heavily on the advice of my new friend.

As I played, I began noticing one common characteristic: the bow was a superb implement. I took a look at it. The tip looked like a Dodd (a very well-known English bow maker with a distinct style). I was fascinated by the bow as I stared it up and down. It was beautiful.

While trying more instruments, I started to simultaneously try the bow with more intent. I chose excerpts based on challenging bow techniques to see how well it responded.

It was absolutely brilliant.

After a few more cellos, my curiosity got the better of me and I just had to know what kind of bow it was. I assumed it was something very expensive—a Dodd of the highest order. I was guessing an auction estimate of $15,000–$20,000. I asked my friend to look up the lot number in the catalog. He showed me the entry. It was described as an “English bow with a stick attributed to James Brown and an unknown frog. Estimated $2,000–$5,000.”

My jaw dropped. It was not by a famous maker, did not cost an arm and a leg, and was a composite (meaning that circumstances required part of the bow be remade by another maker at a later date). This was not a bow for a collector. This was a bow for a player, and I loved it.

Elated, I sincerely asked the gentleman to refrain from bidding on the bow when the auction itself opened. He was glad to oblige. “This is your bow!” he exclaimed.

The day of the auction arrived and I was ready. I had never bid on a bow or instrument before. Auctions had always fascinated me, as I was dragged to many as a child—all to furnish my childhood home with antiques—but I had never participated myself.

I created my Tarisio account and realized that the auction had already finished.

What? Really?

It was 4 o’clock pm and I figured that I would get in before a 5 o’clock closing. But 5 o’clock pm in London is 11 am in New York. I was 5 hours late. There it was, my opportunity to get a great bow—a great steal—gone. I was disappointed, to say the least. Out of sheer curiosity I examined the lots to see at what price points various items closed. Out of over 300 lots, 298 sold. That left me a shred of hope. I went through hundreds of lots before landing on cello bows.

My dream bow had not sold. I got on the phone right away, spoke to the auction house, and the bow was mine. Hallelujah! What were the odds? The only cello bow not to sell was the only one I desired.

Not only did I purchase the bow for the minimum accepted bid, but I received a reduction in the buyer’s premium, as I was the first in and first out. What fortune! What luck! I was on cloud nine. My Russian friend had been true to his word. Bless his heart.

To add more joy to the situation, I removed the frog after picking up the bow from the auction house only to find a stamp on the inner part of the frog that read “Paul Siefried.” Paul Martin Siefried is one of the most respected bow makers in the world, and made my first full-size bow my parents bought me when I was 10 years old. Not only was it a welcome surprise, as I had been playing a Siefried for 14 years, it also increased the value of the bow.

A few months passed and I still loved the bow. I played all my spring and summer concertos, recitals, and chamber performances with it. It had everything—projecting tone, subtlety, and color to spare. One night I was set to have dinner with my parents and the widower of my cello teacher from high school. Toby Saks was a remarkable cellist and a remarkable woman. She was hard on me, that’s for sure, but she believed in me and gave me immeasurable tutelage of the highest order. She was a huge inspiration, and I always sought her approval and appreciation. She was a huge part of my musical life, and I am so lucky to have known her and studied with her. Our close relationship made it all the more difficult for me when she passed away suddenly in the summer of 2013. She left behind an amazing husband Marty, and I was set to have a meal with him and my parents in New York.

We met at my parents’ apartment and began to catch up. I always liked him, and it was good to see him since I had had little contact with him following Toby’s passing. Eventually the conversation turned to Toby, and it was very meaningful to me. I was able to express to him how much she meant to me both personally and professionally. He affirmed that, though demanding of me, she was proud of what I had accomplished in her lifetime.

Then I felt I had to ask the question I had been meaning to ask for two years but felt ashamed to ask in the face of such tragedy. “So…” I hesitated, “what happened to the bows?”

Toby had a superb collection of fine French, American, and English bows that she never allowed me to either see or play. She would not even divulge how many bows she had or who made them. All I knew is that it was an important collection.

Marty replied flippantly, “I sold them all.”

I was in disbelief, and retorted sarcastically, “Thanks for calling me!” and followed it up with a huff. He was shocked at my reaction. “I would have jumped at an opportunity to buy one of Toby’s bows,” I said.

Silence followed.

After a few moments, he said (with much sincerity), “I am so sorry.” There was nothing else to be said. He had to sell the bows. I knew that. Toby had children from a previous marriage and her assets had to be liquidated. I understood that, but I was emotional. I wanted a piece of Toby for the ages. She left this earth much too soon and I missed her. I wanted to feel a connection, albeit to something inanimate.

I calmed down. The air became less tense and I inquired as to where the bows went, to whom, and who made them. He went through the list, which was quite impressive, and went through who had a part in selling various parts of the collection. He concluded, “All the rest of the bows that weren’t sold I put in the Tarisio auction this past May.”

Wait . . . it couldn’t be. My mind started racing. “Did all the bows sell?” I uttered, as I tried to reign in my potential excitement.

“There was one bow that didn’t sell,” he replied, “but then someone bought it later in the day, which was great because I don’t know what I would have done with it.”

Paul Siefried made the frog. The lot numbers matched.

I bought Toby’s bow.

Cellist Julian Schwarz made his orchestral debut at the age of 11 playing the Saint-Saëns Concerto No. 1 with the Seattle Symphony with his father, Gerard Schwarz, on the podium. He has performed with symphonies and in chamber-music festivals throughout the United States and internationally. He was awarded first prize in the professional cello division of the inaugural Alice and Eleonore Schoenfeld International String Competition in Hong Kong, and received his bachelor of music degree from Juilliard, where he studied with Joel Krosnick. He is pursuing his master of music degree, also at Juilliard. Schwarz performs on a cello made by Gennaro Gagliano in 1743.

Boston Globe: Watertown bow maker practices musical alchemy

Boston Globe
By Jeremy Eichler

Yo-Yo Ma remembers preparing to be diplomatic. His wife had just surprised him with a newly commissioned cello bow for his 60th birthday.

Such a lovely gesture, he thought, while at the same time feeling slightly skeptical. He already played on a 19th-century bow by the most revered maker in history.

Ma’s friends, who had gathered last fall for a festive birthday dinner, zealously insisted that he give the new bow a try. So he did.

“In a few seconds,” Ma recently recalled, “I switched from being polite, to being like, ‘Oh.’ ”

His friends reached for their cellphones.

“We were all just floored by the clarity and projection and the color this new bow was producing,” said David Perlman, a friend of Ma’s who was present at the dinner and had helped engineer the gift. “There was just something electric about it, something that was totally unique.”

Benoit Rolland, the maker of this mysterious new bow, was not present on this occasion. But, curiously enough, neither was he far away.

Born in Paris, Rolland learned his art in the French town of Mirecourt, the storied center of the French instrument-making tradition. You might expect to find him now in a well-appointed shop on a leafy side street in one of Paris’s more elegant districts.

In person, Rolland, 61, exudes an air of calm and a keen intelligence that seems to concentrate behind his warm, watchful eyes. He is quick to apologize for his English, but nonetheless speaks with a streamlined eloquence about his personal approach to his art. “The violin makes the sound,” he likes to say, “but the bow makes the music.”

A trained violinist, Rolland asks to hear a musician play before beginning a new commission. Listening carefully, he then forms what clients describe as an almost eerily insightful picture of a musical personality: one that can encompass the specific expressive contours of a performer’s style, and perhaps even hidden potentials waiting to be unlocked by the right bow.

“He has a great gift of watching and sensing,” says Mutter, by phone from Austria. “It’s more than only knowledge.” The Boston-based Kashkashian concurred: “I don’t know anyone who hasn’t felt that he captured what they needed,” she said.

To match bow to player, Rolland works meticulously to select wood with the right density and sensitivity to vibration; he then tapers, shapes, and cambers the stick according to a particular balance he deems right.

Most recently, however, Rolland has been channeling his mental, physical, and spiritual resources for a client more discerning than most: himself. Rolland in December began the bow — his 1,500th creation — that he sees as a kind of personal celebration.

For it, he has used an uncommonly beautiful and resonant piece of Brazilian Pernambuco wood he had been saving for years, and the rarest ebony from the island of Mauritius, given to him by his teacher, Bernard Ouchard, almost a half-century ago.

In the new bow’s frog — the rectangular part at the base of the bow that moves to control its tension — he placed mother of pearl he harvested himself from a French island off the coast of Paimpol. The frog has been adorned with two diamonds and a delicate gold inlay inspired by a painting of a swallow by his wife, the painter and poet Christine Arveil.

This bow, he explained, would also be a celebration of their partnership. “For me, it is a way to gather all of the ideas I have so far about bows, and to put everything in one bow: this bow.”

When Rolland first elaborated on his plan and the delicacy of work entailed, with adjustments measured in hundredths of a gram and inlays that would require him to construct an entirely new set of tools, it seemed like an almost quixotic quest — as if a leading writer was fearlessly announcing that his next novel would be written on a grain of rice. But he seemed coolly undaunted.

He also spoke of his initial journey into this career and of his early years as a student, when the wood was “so hard, so hard” and it would cut into his sensitive violinist hands. Many times he considered abandoning the profession.

“In a way,” he said, “this is a celebration of a victory over myself.”

It is a strange fate to be a master of an art at once so essential and hidden from view. The public often hears of Stradivarius instruments; bows, by comparison, are rarely discussed. If you are not a string player or married to one, chances are you cannot name a single bow maker, living or legendary.

But without the bow, and its way of keeping a tense string in a state of perpetual excitement, the violin resembles a small, handsomely varnished guitar. “The bow is a very old concept,” Rolland offered one afternoon, sitting at his large oak workbench. “I don’t know, but I think it was born with the first human being, and the first wish to reproduce the human voice through an instrument. There is no way to do that without a bow.”

Yet this undisputed master of bow making has been quietly plying his trade for the last several years from a brightly lit home studio in a certain north-bank arrondissement of greater Boston, one that is perhaps better known as Watertown.

If you attend concerts in the area, chances are you’ve heard a player performing with one of Rolland’s creations. Recognized in 2012 with a MacArthur “genius grant,’’ he has made bows for several leading soloists on the circuit today — including violinist Anne Sophie Mutter and cellist Lynn Harrell — and for 20th-century legends such as Yehudi Menuhin and Mstislav Rostropovich.

He also keeps Boston’s own string players well cared for. In just one typical example, on Monday at New England Conservatory’s Brown Hall, a Music for Food benefit performance will feature no fewer than four prominent string players — violists Kim Kashkashian and Paul Biss, violinist Miriam Fried, and cellist Marcy Rosen — who rely on Rolland’s bows. So do about a dozen Boston Symphony Orchestra string players, including concertmaster Malcolm Lowe.

Yet to actually create a bow from scratch is to practice an odd type of alchemy, transforming what is essentially a hunk of wood and the hair from a horse’s tail into the conduit for the most sublime thoughts of composers through the centuries — and of the players who translate and interpret them.

“It’s just amazing,” says Lowe, the BSO concertmaster. “Some people look at a note or phrase of music on the printed page and ask, ‘Oh, how does it do that to my heart?’ For me, it’s the same thing, but I look at a tree and think, ‘How does Benoit turn this into a bow?’ ”

“Slowly” might be the first answer. Rolland works in an airy studio, his desk placed at an angle below a skylight. He uses many tools he built himself about four decades ago (“They don’t sell bowmaking tools in Home Depot,” he jokes) and others that he inherited from his teacher.

The French school of bowmaking, he explains, prizes physical contact with the wood itself. No power drill or vice is ever used. Rolland grips the bow with his strong left hand, often passing it over the length of the stick to feel its qualities but also, surprisingly, to listen.

“When you work, all the senses must be awake,” he said. “The sound of the wood will tell you if your plane is well-sharpened, if your wood is docile or rebellious, and if the wood is good for transmitting vibrations.

“This one has a very clear sound,” he continued, holding up the deep auburn stick that was to become No. 1,500. “It conveys vibration very fast, so it will produce a very bright sound.”

As for the basic physics of the bow, as Rolland explains it, the horsehair sets the string in motion, and the vibration is transmitted to the instrument. But the vibration then returns through the bridge back to the wood stick, creating a kind of closed feedback loop of sound creation.

Rolland says the ideal bow requires the harmonizing of opposing goals: strength and flexibility. It should also feel completely natural in the hand, “as if a piece of wood has been transformed into an extension of your own muscle.” In other words: countless hours of his work are invested in the creation of an object that, if he has achieved his goal, will effectively disappear.

Being invisible, however, should not mean taken for granted. “Composer, interpreter, and maker: they form three corners of a triangle,” Rolland says, his eyes brightening just before he turns back to his workbench. “Without any one of them, there is no music.”

GQ: An Orchestra Is Mashing Up Kanye West’s Hits with Beethoven’s to Create “Yeethoven”

GQ
By Nicole Silverberg

It's pretty epic

Los Angeles's Debut Orchestra of the Young Musicians Foundation is taking a bold approach to their Great Music Series, performing some of Beethoven's classic works alongside Kanye West's Yeezus to create the perfectly titled "Yeethoven." I'm sure it tickles Kanye's fancy to be put alongside someone as musically revered as Beethoven, but it actually works. While it seems a little strange, partially because the best part of Kanye's music is frequently, you know, Kanye rapping, when you listen to the preview, it makes sense.

Yeezus and hits by Beethoven, including "Egmont Overture" and "String Quartet No. 14 (op. 131)," are played alongside each other and reveal some striking similarities. The conductor Yuga Cohler explains that both Beethoven and Yeezy make music with a "brashness creating wild contrast, thrashing juxtapositions within a single bar of music," which isn't exactly what I think of when I'm listening to "I Am a God," but now that Cohler said it, I'm like, Oh, yeah!

Cohler said he chose Kanye and Beethoven because they both have a "willingness to ruthlessly abandon tradition, and their influence on that larger culture can't be overstated." Seeing as Yeezy is getting his own orchestral arrangements, I'm gonna have to agree. Just one question: Does this mean I have to start wearing gowns and pearls to his concerts?

Rolling Stones: 'Yeethoven' Concert to Juxtapose Music of Kanye West, Beethoven

Rolling Stones
By Brittany Spanos

The music of Kanye West and Beethoven will be compared and spliced up by a 70-piece orchestra during a Los Angeles concert.

On April 16th, Beethoven will meet Kanye West when a 70-piece orchestra mashes up and reimagines the work of the two artists. The program is part of the Great Music Series hosted by the Young Musicians Foundation.

Co-curated by conductor Yuga Cohler and arranger Stephen Feigenbaum, "Yeethoven" aims to show the commonalities between the seemingly dissimilar artists. "Obviously, they work within very different traditions," a voiceover reflects in the promotional clip for the concert. "Their willingness to ruthlessly upend tradition and their influence on the larger culture can't be overstated."

The concert will feature six works by Beethoven and six works from West's Yeezus that will be "juxtaposed" and "spliced together" by the orchestra live. It will be put on for free at the Aratani Theatre — Japanese American Cultural & Community Center in Los Angeles.

In 2012, a year before West released Yeezus, he compared himself to the classical composer during a concert in Atlantic City. "I am flawed as a human being. I am flawed as a person. As a man, I am flawed, but my music is perfect," he began. "This is the best you're gonna get ladies and gentlemen in this lifetime, I'm sorry. You could go back to Beethoven and shit, but as far as this lifetime, though, this is all you got."