Tribute Recording of Gratitude!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING (Canada) !

Thanksgiving is a great holiday in terms of faith. It reminds us to reflect on the fact that, though many things are wrong in the world and need correcting, in virtually every circumstance there are always aspects that lend really good helping hands in life that provide hope for the potential of fulfilment. In my opinion, people who complain “How can an all powerful God allow such horror in the world” are guilty of reading only what they want from the Bible and other religions… they fail to realize that the troubles in this world come from people much more than God, and that people are also the biggest hope and potential for beauty and grace! Maybe that’s the actual purpose of our existence in this world…

The origins of the holiday are contended (see Wikipedia), but 2 things remain clear:

1. The name suggests gratitude,
2. it is celebrated at the end of harvest time.

#2 explains why we celebrate it in Canada a month and a half before the U.S.A. Being “The true North, strong and free”, our harvest ends much sooner than down south… does it ever actually end in Florida or Texas?

In terms of home, there are many things I am grateful for, that will remain at home. In terms of the oboe, the focus of this blog, there are 3 things for which I am really grateful this year:

1. physical therapists and fitness professionals,
2. social media on the Internet,
3. a good job and God’s blessing for apparent job security!

These have been really instrumental in motivating me to practice diligently and strive for the sound, technique and musical expression I know I am capable of. Right now, I cannot play as many hours in a day as I would like, but what I can play, the only obstacle remaining seems to be concentration: as long as I keep diligent with physio. exercises, I can re-train my technique to play as fast as I need. My mind keeps interrupting my fingers, but my fingers are capable again!

Facebook, You-Tube, Twitter, the Blog and the BBoard

I cannot overstate my appreciation for Mark Charette (at the BBoard – visit here) and the creators of Facebook groups (in order of when I joined them), Ivan Di Bello (visit here), Sergio Manu + Ambrogio Gentili (visit here)  and Frédéric Moisand + Shi Li (visit here) for starting amazing communities where we can all share opinions, tips and tricks and examples of our favourite performances: I dedicate this recording to you! (I hope I do you justice!)

Thank you BBoard and Facebook people!

Such interaction, sharing and exposure to the greatest musicians was not available when I was a student. It really increases our panoramic perspective of how a piece of music can sound like and what can be done with our fantastic instrument! What a wonderful thing to live!

Thanksgiving Recording

In keeping with my observation of the last couple of posts, I did this recording without really feeling ready for it. But apart from lacking maturity, the single worst thing was a wandering mind: the more comfortable I get playing, the more my mind wanders and the worse I mess-up. This is nothing new: I also experienced it in the best of my days. But somehow, playing with others in concert sort of removed most of the problems. Playing with a recording of myself – with nothing at all when recording the 1st part – the mind is free to wander! In a concert, exam or audition, I would be told to have trouble with technique, but in fact, the faults in rhythms and fingerings here is due to concentration problems (and fatigue…).

Telemann, Sonata in A minor

The whole world by now should know the tragic shooting and bombing in Oslo, Norway. I remember the shooting at École Polytechnique de Montréal (I had started the Conservatoire), I remember the shootings at Columbine and Virginia Tech.: as terrifying as these were, as much as they stirred society and destroyed our sense of safety in this world, the recent shooting in Oslo was far worse.

This is not expected anywhere in the developed world, but when it hits a country that won “top country” to live in for nearly 10 years (taking over from Canada which held it for nearly 8 years), there is just no describing how that shakes our perception of the world.

There is very little that can be said about such wasteful horror. For sure, the perpetrators’ goals will backfire as the world, and Norwegians in particular, deplore their actions.

Anniversary Recording

Here it is, that “baroque sonata” I mentioned in the past few posts. It took longer than expected because, well, I am an hobbyist! Apart from lacking endurance, work and projects for my wife and I have been more involving than usual, so there was just no way to record more than one movement a day. And, naturally, when one day’s recordings are not satisfactory, an extra day is required! And the last couple of weeks, very hot and very humid (calculated “feels like” of 117° Farenheit or 47° Celcius) means that my best reeds were not as stable as they were 2 months ago… (see previous post)

All this means I wanted to delay the recording again, especially since I have a 3-day weekend to make reeds (and clean-out the garage!), but new reeds are never good for performance anyway and I have a few things to celebrate:

1. well over 11 thousand visits since the blog began last Christmas!
2. a little over 1 year since my oboe was revoiced,
3. a little over 1 year since my oboistic revival began: more seriously practicing an average of 30-45 minutes a day.
4. the 3rd birthday of our first house-dog Popcorn!

So I decided to go ahead. The final recording is probably the best representation of my current abilities after one year of revival. I ended up using the “gold reed” from this previous post.

… a difficult joy!

Telemann, Sonata A-, 1st mvt.

In a previous post and other places, I said that the music of Telemann and Haendel is just as difficult to play as it is beautiful. In the case of Haendel, there is something in the ease of the melodic patterns that just requires every ounce of musical understanding and artistic soul the performer is capable of conjuring.

In the case of Telemann, there is just no end to the possibilities in the music! I’ve been practicing (anew) Telemann’s sonata for oboe in A minor for 2 or 3 months now, and seriously, every time I sit down to one of the movements, I discover something else; either a better way to phrase a lick, or simply a different and equally beautiful way to perform it.

Telemann, Sonata A-, 2nd mvt.

Choosing one style and staying with it becomes difficult - besides, I’m lacking the finger and sound control for some of the styles I would have wanted: they sounded “grotesque” in the literal sense… perhaps these styles require period instruments or maybe I need to experiment with microphone positioning more!

 

Recording & Production:

I did not make a video this time because I wanted to try out a new microphone layout in the dining room for a better sound quality.

Telemann, Sonata A-, 3rd mvt.

It would have been too much hassle to set-up my computer with the web-cam on the main floor near the entrance to capture the video. I think the sound impression of a recital hall is much better, but there is still much to discuss and experiment.

Also, I had mentioned that with the Free Recording software Audacity, all kinds of effects can be done in conjunction with multi-track recording.

In this case, I used it to tweak the piano accompaniment obtained from Music Minus One (MMO): I changed the piano track and then recorded my performance on another track while listening to the modified piano part.

Telemann, Sonata A-, 4th mvt.

I hope to discuss some reflections on the recording next week. For now, some remarks about each movement:

1. In a couple of places, you might hear a “hhussshhh”: that’s the background noise from the piano part getting much louder. The piano player gave a very academic and simplistic performance, one that matches what can be expected of most 1st year university oboe students. In some places, there was a soft p “echo” where I preferred to emphasise the repeat. So I made that piano segment louder… unfortunately, that included the “white noise” from the MMO recording!
   
2. I sped-up the piano part because I just felt it was not lively enough. Listen closely and you will find a few blips, but generally the technique is not so bad. My arms still tenses up when playing as a result of doing too much at the gym too fast. Furthermore, on these recording days, I neglected stretching and such: the resulting strain shows in the technique and the sound control.
   
3. If you think the piano sounds Honky-Tonk, that is because I slowed it down. The accompaniment was too fast for the atmosphere I wanted to portray. The pitfall to this: a kind of inner-echo is produced, making it sound like an old silent-movie piano.
   
4. Starting to play before the recorded piano (even with 4 metronome taps) makes it really hard to play in time with the piano! Predicting when the piano will start playing took a lot of practice, especially at the grand pause before the re-exposition!

At the beginning of movements 2 and 4, it almost sounds like I am playing two oboes at the same time. I have absolutely no explanation for this. It can’t even be explained by copy-pasting things in Audacity: to do so would either have no effect (same track pasted twice) or sound really bad (different tracks overlapping). I can only guess that I had turned my body relatively to the walls in such a way that the echo would be picked-up by the microphone pointing away from me. I will discuss this in the next posting.