(Un-) settling Sites and Styles
(2021)
author(s): Einar Røttingen, Bente Elisabeth Finseraas
published in: Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, University of Bergen
(Un-)settling sites and styles: In search of new expressive means.
Eight performers (voice, piano, violin, cello), one musicologist and one composer aspired to unsettle their habitual ways of working with musical interpretation of 20th century and contemporary Norwegian composers. By collaborating to develop new perspectives and methods, they investigated questions of style and how different sites influenced their rehearsals and performances.
How do performers find new expressive means? How can intersubjective exchange within a research group contribute to articulating tacit knowledge? How can mutual unsettling approaches influence conventional or subjective attitudes of fidelity to a score or a performance tradition? How can novel sounds, musical material and musical meaning emerge beyond prejudiced conceptions or through improvisation?
The three-year project was facilitated by the Norwegian Artistic Research Programme and the Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design (Grieg Academy), University of Bergen, and resulted in texts, sound recordings, videos, and new commented score editions.
The French cello bowing style from around 1900
(2016)
author(s): Mikaela Gronberg
published in: Codarts
The Artistic Research has been full of surprises, opportunities and it even created a world full of new ideas for me which I did not think was possible in the beginning of the research.
When I started to do the research, my first thought was to focus on relaxation in performance but since I already been very interested about French cello playing for a few years I decided to change the path because I found my topic less treated and full of potentials. Thereafter I started in the Performance Practice domain where Job ter Haar became my coach and to have a cellist as a coach when you are a cellist yourself has been very inspiring, helpful and motivating for me.
From a few years ago I have always wanted to have a broader insight in the bowing style and a deeper understanding about it, because I knew that it could led to self-improvement in my own playing and also be useful for other cellists. As I have been fascinated of cellists such as Paul Tortelier, André Navarra and Maurice Gendron for their way of playing the French repertoire and their use of the bowing technique, I was curious to find out more about their heritage in French playing and how they applied this in their musical language. The knowledge about this area has never been close to me, which I will explain later in my motivation.
After a few domain meetings my head was full of new ideas for the Artistic Research. The journey took off with the French bowing style from around 1900 on the cello, where I got the opportunity to research in several elements of the bowing style and how I could apply them to the French repertoire and close related repertoire from that period.
Since then, I have felt that my choice of the subject has been right and has kept me interested to progress in this unknown area for me throughout my Artistic Research.
FRIEDRICH GRÜTZMACHER Editions and transcriptions for cello
(2016)
author(s): Ivan Nogueira Martinez
published in: Codarts
The cello - as the violin or the string instruments in general - has a long and important tradition from hundreds of years. We know about many masters of the cello who could really master the instrument and contribute with something significant for its development in technique and style of playing. I could mention many names: Boccherini, Duport, Kummer, Popper, Tortelier… All these cellist lived in different moments of the history, and they did important contributions to the cello. Those contributions made the cello be like it is today, the way we play it and the way we practice it in classical music. Are we aware of that?
In order to be a good player, we need to spend a lot of time working on the technique. It needs to be so good that we can master our instrument for playing the great repertoire of the instrument. Nowadays, one of the most spread ways of practicing the technique is by playing studies. Every instrument has its studies, which every professional classical musician must have played in order to become a good player.
I always enjoyed playing studies on the cello. During my growing period as a cellist, I played many of the most important works of this kind: starting with S.Lee or Dotzauer, continuing with Duport, Franchomme, Popper, Grützmacher… Every method has been written in a different time, for a different purpose, and to develop different technical skills.
Some years ago, my curiosity about this topic became more intense. It happened in a period where I came back into the practising of the Duport studies after many years of having done so. I realized that the edition I was using was made by the cellist Pierre Fournier (French cellist, 1906-1986). I wondered how the original version of Duport would be like, and where my edition came from. What I found out was something that changed my vision of the work and woke up my curiosity on the field of editions. All the modern versions of this Duport work are based in the edition made by F. Grützmacher. His edition is very different to the original. It reflects the way of playing and the aesthetics of other different period of time and it also reflects the strong personality of this cellist. Those modern versions are closer to the Grützmacher version than to the original, what made me think that this edition may have been so important and popular at its time that it became the standard version of the work. At that moment I started to be interested about Grützmacher. Who was him? How much did he influenced the modern cello style of playing? What can I learn from him?
Adrien-François Servais’s contribution to the evolution of the cello technique
(2016)
author(s): Aurore Montaulieu
published in: KC Research Portal
Student name and number: Aurore Montaulieu, 3048780
Main subject: Cello
Research supervisor: Dr. Anna Scott
Research Paper Title: How Adrien-François Servais (1807-1866) Improved the Cello Technique During the 19th Century
Research Question: With particular focus on his scores, how did Adrien-François Servais advance cello technique in the middle of the 19th century, and with what implications for modern performers?
Summary of Results: Widely considered to have been the 'Paganini of the Cello,' Adrien-François Servais (1807 - 1866) was one of the most famous cellists of the 19th century, and is best known today for his 6 Caprices Op. 11. Many modern performers however are unaware of Servais’s numerous and important contributions to the history of cello construction, playing style, and technique. After a brief overview of notable cellists (including Duport, Romberg, and Dotzauer) and playing techniques (including vibrato, portamento, and bow-holds) that coexisted at the beginning of the 19th century, this research paper goes on to examine Servais’s life and work as an independent concert artist. While Servais did not leave behind any methods or treatises, a close study of contemporaneous accounts of his playing style, technique, instrument preferences, concert programs, and his association with many of the leading composers of his day reveals his enduring contributions to the rise of the cello as a vehicle for the new Romantic virtuoso style. Most notable among these contributions were his standardization of the use of the endpin, his wide-ranging and successful career as a touring performer, and the invaluable impression he left on the younger generation of cellist-composers (including Davidov and Popper). It is however an in-depth analysis of his Fantaisie 'Souvenir de Saint-Pétersbourg' Op. 15 that ultimately reveals the most revolutionary and innovative aspects of his technique and playing style: from his fingering, shifting, and use of harmonics, to his bowing, phrasing, articulation, arpeggiation, use of thumb position, and extroverted approach - elements that have all gone on to form the basis of modern cello playing. During my presentation I intend to provide an overview of these findings, and to demonstrate evidence of Servais's technical and stylistic achievements as revealed by his Fantaisie Op. 15 on my own instrument.
Biography:
Aurore Montaulieu is a French cellist. Born in Cannes, she started her musical studies at the age of 4. In 2012, she graduated with her Bachelors degree from the Pôle Supérieur of Paris-Boulogne-Billancourt in Hélène Dautry’s class. Aurore is currently in the Orchestra Masters program at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague in Michel Strauss and Jan-Ype Nota’s class. She has had the opportunity to receive guidance from great musicians such as F. Helmerson, G. Hoffman, P. Wispelway and D. Geringas. In 2012, she joined the Orchestre de Paris’s Academy and is a member of the Gustav Mahler JugendOrchester since 2014. Aurore Montaulieu plays a Roberto Masini cello built for her in 2010.
Chordal Continuo Realization on the Violoncello: A look at the practice of chordal accompaniment by cellists over the course of two centuries, with a focus on recitative accompaniment practices between 1774 and 1832
(2014)
author(s): Eva Lymenstull
published in: KC Research Portal
Name: Eva Lymenstull
Main Subject: Baroque Cello Research Coach: Johannes Boer
Title of Research: Chordal Continuo Realization on the Violoncello: A look at the practice of chordal accompaniment by cellists over the course of two centuries, with a focus on recitative accompaniment practices between 1774 and 1832
Research Question:
What was the practice of chordal continuo realization by cellists in the eighteenth century? What historical precedence exists, in what musical contexts would the practice be used, and how does this realization sound when used in performance?
Summary of Results:
The cello was used as a continuo instrument from the earliest days of basso continuo through the early nineteenth century. In addition to the cello being used as a single-voice continuo instrument, evidence exists that some cellists realized their continuo lines, creating multi-voice chordal accompaniments. Accounts of performances in which cellists played chordal continuo realizations exist, though very sporadically, ranging from 1657 to 1834. Despite arguments from a number of scholars and performers that the use of chordal continuo realizations by cellists was widespread during the eighteenth century, there is insufficient evidence, much of which is highly circumstantial, that the practice was common before 1774. Several treatises were published between 1774 and 1834, however, that give clear and detailed instructions, including examples of execution, for the use of chordal continuo realizations on the cello in secco recitatives in opera. The use of this practice at that time sheds an interesting light on the role of the cello, the development of cello technique, and about the virtuosity required for this type of accompaniment. The presentation will include a discussion of the various sides of the debate over chordal continuo practices in the Baroque, live demonstrations by myself and colleagues of the chordal recitative techniques outlined in the treatises I have examined, and a power point presentation.