zbd1960

I'm not aware of any premium Japanese cellos. There is good stuff from Eastern Europe, but you really need to know what you're looking for. A high percentage were mass produced as school and basic student instruments. Unfortunately, unlike me, instruments like cellos (well good ones) improve with age. One of the reasons I won't commission the making of a cello is once made, it can take years and years (possibly decades) for the sound to develop. In addition, a good luthier might have a 3 year waiting list, a year to make the instrument and prices around £12k upwards

I know, even more expensive

Yes, but we can't afford it! There are some strings I'd like to try, but at around £300 a set, you can't really experiment. My cello is German, dates to around 1900. If I had the money, I'd like a nice C19th English / German / French / Italian instrument. Unless you are very lucky, you'd be looking at prices of £15k and upwards - nice English cellos are very expensive. Forget an C18th instrument, I don't have enough gold bricks for that. My bow is a basic German pernambuco one cost £450 back in 2011. I've tried bows costing up to £1,500 but not felt there to be much improvement. I've been told I need to spend a lot more than that to see 'real' improvements... I have had a discussion with my cello teacher about once I've moved house, I might treat myself... but not rushing

Cello strings haven't moved much... still about £300 to replace mine. Fortunately, the lower strings don't have to be replaced very often, tends to be the top A string about every 3 years.

... I have a practice chanter.... 🙂They're not expensive if you'd like to learn?

It's a bit random at the moment as to how expeditiously items get through customs. I've had things sail through in no time at all and others go nowhere for a week. Unfortunately, things are not as seamless as they were...

Covid etc made a huge mess of the amateur orchestra scene, so it was good to have a gig on Sunday afternoon with the small community orchestra I play cello with. We played one of Dvorak's Slavonic dances, an arrangement of Saint-Saens Carnival of the Animals, and Schubert symphony #5. The venue was a little C13th church in Shropshire. As bribery to get an audience, orchestra members made cakes. I made lemon drizzle cake....

I realised I never put up an image of the exhibition in Liverpool last month. In the end it was a subset of about 20 or so images, printed 600mm high as a single print 10m long...

For anyone who happens to wander into Chester from now until (probably) end of August, I have an exhibition of some images from a project "Being our authentic selves" on display in the Rainbow Tea Rooms, Bridge Street, Chester.

Evidently, I'm a weirdo... When I was about 10, so over 50 years ago 😱, my gran started to teach me to read music (she had a piano). I went to a grammar school and we had two music lessons a week all the way from 1st to 5th form (err years 7 to 11 in modern speak??). One of those lessons was music theory / reading music. I started playing cello at school (that was a second form option, so age 12/13) so had to read bass clef. Sadly, I only had the one year of peri lessons as my parents didn't know how the system worked... I took music O level as an optional subject studied in lunchtimes in 6th form. Roll forwards to my mid-30s and I start singing lessons. I soon end up singing bass/baritone in various choirs and regularly performing in concerts - some quite major. In my 40s I do the OU music theory course, which gets you to around grade 7/8 equivalent. I started learning playing the bass viol - you have to have lessons as the techniques are very different to cello. The viol uses bass clef and alto clef (C3) when it goes higher. Some music is notated in octave treble (sounds octave lower than written). Then I bought a tenor viol, which is all written in alto clef (treble when higher). Roll forward to my early fifties and I start playing sax and buy my first cello. Cello uses bass, tenor clef(C4), and treble. I am well aware of how easy it is to acquire bad habits that can really hold you back, so it's find-a-teacher time again... So... it should be no surprise that starting bass, I found a teacher. Lessons currently in abeyance pending a house move. So yes, I always get a teacher to help me to get good technique. Online can help with some stuff, but you do need a teacher that can point out exactly what you need to do/change/fix. I can read all four of the 'standard' clefs - bass, tenor, alto, and treble. There are other clefs, which at various music summer schools have been thrown at me to read - baritone or soprano clef anyone? I'm a bit out of practice on the alto clef as I've not played viol for a while. At some point I'd like to take G8 theory just for fun... (I know, I'm weird). Bagpipes anyone?

Apparently, it was some sort of protest poke at Putin...

Well... I broke a habit of not watching it since the mid-70s out of curiosity. I had to mute the sound after a while as I just found it hard going. One or two good singers amongst the less good ones. The French singer was a little like an update on Edith Piaf in terms of sound style. Germany seemed to be something like glam rock meets death metal (in appearance anyway). I've no idea what Croatia was doing

Thanks for the comments. No, I tune my basses as standard in 4ths and leave the 5ths to the cello.

Musicians with questionable behaviour... It was ever thus. For reference, I suggest Gesualdo, Renaissance composer... murderer...

I submit my final project in the next few days for my BA in Digital Imaging and Photography. The course has taken me in some unusual directions. I regard myself as a landscape photographer primarily, so do street, documentary etc photography has been a challenge and a different tack. I also have ended up making my own photobooks, so I've been getting to grips with bookbinding as well. My final project is a 'Leporello' format book - a concertina folded print. The print is 14 metres long. It's printed on inkjet paper, so folding it has been a major challenge.... The project is based around the the Chester Centurions, a rugby team in Chester and I've worked with both the touch and union teams. The work of my colleagues and I will be exhibited at the Open Eye Gallery at the Pier Head in Liverpool. My book will be 'pasted' to the wall as a single large print 14m long... There is a private viewing from 5pm to 7pm on Wednesday 24th May (all welcome - it's free). It will be on show until the close on Sunday 28th. I expect to be on site some of Sat and Sun as well as the opening. If anyone is around, it would be good to see people.

My camera is a mirrorless Nikon Z6, which can do 4K video. I think the video length limit is 30 mins. You can plug in an external mike. Or, you can record sound separately on a digital recorder then sync it in post-production using editing software. Just be aware that video, especially 4K eats storage. You'll need both a big memory card and a fast one.

Or "e-", "i-", "digital-" etc. Recent additions to the list include "eco-" and "green-"

Rehearsals resumed last night. Sight reading of Beethoven's overture 'Coriolan'... fiendish cello part with a lot of very non-standard arpeggios needing an awful lot of shifting.

More snake oil - they need to go and join the chakra alignment fraternity and take the correct set of crystals with them.

I would agree with those recommending getting a teacher to get started with bowing. If you're going 'French' route, then grip will be similar to what I use on cello, which is NOT the same as how a violinist or violist holds and uses a bow. There are a lot of aspects to bowing and having someone get your basic technique off to a good start will save you a great deal of trouble down the line.

One of the thing about being a cellist in several orchestras is you don't usually do that many gigs. Most amateur orchestras follow academic 'terms' with a term of weekly rehearsals and a concert at the end. There are huge problems with this pattern since it means, for example, that most choirs and orchestras in an area have their concerts at more-or-less the same time (one committee I was on liaised with other groups in the area to avoid concert dates clashing). My two orchestras at the moment don't in fact do that many concerts. Both will only have one this year: one at the end of June, and the other in early July. Both will be after I've moved house and I'll be about 150 miles away... What is particularly frustrating is both gigs are much later than you'd expect the 'summer' term concert to be.

Most adults lose the top octave (nominally above 10kHz) by the age of 25...

Yes, "flute a bec" is a recorder. The 'transverse flute' which is what we understand by the word 'flute' didn't really take off until the C18th.

Yeah the spacing at the low end is too wide to make that viable

All my instruments are with Allianz. I have three policies with them: one for cellos, one for saxes, one for basses and associated gear. I did have to claim on the cello one a few years ago when the cello fell over, which snapped the bridge, took the finger board off and did a lot of cosmetic damage. All sorted with luthier and no hassle.