A birthday song (and photo)

December 30, 2014 • 12:24 pm

Reader Natalie, a professional harpsichordist, performed a birthday song for me: “The Fly,” which appears on YouTube with the following note:

After “Le Moucheron” by François Couperin (1668-1733)

It is cold in Europe today. The fly settled on my hand and expected me to play slowly so it wouldn’t fall off.

Be sure to listen all the way to the end.

An update: Birthday greetings from Toncho, the owner of Lubo (shown here) and Vassy. Toncho, you may recall, is the 18-year-old Bulgarian Siamese cat who has a desperate desire to nom cucumbers:

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108 thoughts on “A birthday song (and photo)”

    1. François Couperin wrote pieces entre autre in honour of flies (Le Moucheron), bees (Les Abeilles), butterflies (Les Papillons), amphibians (L’amphibie), nightingales (Le rossignol-en-amour, Le rossignol vainqueur), as well as hommages to various different flowers (….), a morning alarm (Le reveil-matin) and a piece about nothing (Le petit rien). Etc. But no piece about cats!!! What would Baihu have done…

    2. Me too! I wish they were more popular but now I’m laughing at the image of harpischord rock stars.

          2. Ahh the embed worked! Must be how you fooled it into thinking I am watching it from Chicago!

            🙂

            Cool too.

  3. Happy Birthday, Jerry, and best wishes for your next journey around the sun. Next year will be an exciting one!

    A lovely piece of music. My expert interpretation: the fly was caught by the cat.

    1. Nice. Then, predictably as sunrise, a commentator (Paul Angiolillo) decries the dichotomy, and supports his errant analysis by equivocating on the word “faith”. Odd that he should have been astute enough to realize that the word has more than one meaning, but not astute enough to keep from falling into that fallacy.

      It is still true that the epistemologies of science and religion are antithetical, with the former based on observation, reason and logic; the latter on faith, tradition and authority.

  7. Lovely piece of music. That was a nice mimic of a cat too. Is it typical of harpsichords to have the white/black keys reversed from that of a piano? I’ve never noticed that before, though I don’t recall seeing many harpsichords.

    1. It’s quite common for modern instruments to have the ‘reversed’ keyboard, though not universal. Historically it did occur though probably it’s more common in modern reconstructions than in the harpsichord era because is is different and looks cool.

      I have a harpsichord with light wood (boxwood, I think) naturals and dark wood (walnut) sharps, and a clavichord with black naturals (not actual ebony but a stained hardwood, I think walnut) and bone-topped sharps.

      Real ebony was used because it is extremely hard and long-wearing. Nowadays due to the scarcity (overuse led to real ebony being endangered) usually “ebonized” wood is used.

      Ivory, too, for its feel and durability, though it’s hard to enjoy. I actually prefer the feel of bone (usually cow bone is used, and I’ve read of builders today who get large bones from a slaughterhouse and slice them up themselves, though it’s enough of a pain that most builders get pre-sliced blanks).

      Here’s a really fun keyboard (early 18th century) though I think it would give me a headache to play:

      http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MIM_Clavichord_CN344.jpg

        1. Probably not as bad as you think. Harpsichord kits were a thing in the ’60s; my Mom built one before she met my Dad. She didn’t have any special woodworking or crafts skills.

          b&

          3. She played as well as any non-music-major amateur keyboardist back in the day. They gave the instrument to an ASU graduate student many many moons ago, and she hadn’t played it for quite some time before then.

            But, growing up, I did play around with tuning it…and learned quite viscerally that, once you make it all the way ’round the circle of fifths, you don’t wind back up where you started….

            Were I so inclined, I know I could become a competent piano tuner. Above average, perhaps. But I’ve listened to a true master tuner at work…and, I could hear what was happening but no way could I imagine replicating that, myself. He’d start with an instrument that almost anybody would consider in tune…and, as he worked, the whole thing magically opened up and turned into a completely different instrument. Pretty mind-blowing, really.

            b&

          4. Cool.

            Another thing about tuning, at least in my experience, is that the longer you’re at it, the more difficult it becomes to maintain an “objective ear”. Often when I’m tuning the organ (just touch-up, extensive tuning is done by a professional tuner), after 20 or so minutes of listening for “beats”, I start to lose my instinctual and immediate response of “oh that’s flat/sharp”.

          5. Oh, fatigue is a very real problem. Part of what amazed me about this guy…he’d spend the day keeping practice room pianos from falling to pieces, and then work his magic on two different Steinway Ds in two different halls in the evening just before concerts.

            b&

    2. Yes, it’s typical. Organ keyboards are often reversed like that, as well.

      Is how they made ‘me back in the day, before you whippersnappers with all your pianofortes came along!

      1. *’em*

        (And, as M. Janello points out, dark uppers/light lowers may have been more common, but by no means universal, is I’m afraid I may have implied.)

          1. M Janello…thanks for your insight on this topic. I’ve never read about the advantages/disadvantages of natural materials used for the keys. It seems the keys have a depth I never knew of. I’ve only played plastic keys. Regardless, that old harpsichord is like all old instruments: hard to play. Nowadays it’s a flick of the switch and wrist and let the fingers softly walk…I’m thinking digital keyboards and Stratocasters. Back then (don’t know the date) it was more physical; perhaps it created heightened competition in the players..?..? Ben Goren knows that air forced instruments like the trumpet don’t have the same luxury of easier playing throughout the centuries (maybe a little easier? on a limb here). Jerry had a good description of Joe Cocker’s style who seemed to emulate that physical feel as a vocalist…singing hasn’t gotten any easier either. There is a fascinating difference between touch and breath.

            off topic…thanks to musical beef: whippersnappers & flimminflammin. I like seeing those words written.

          2. Ben Goren knows that air forced instruments like the trumpet don’t have the same luxury of easier playing throughout the centuries (maybe a little easier? on a limb here).

            Actually, there’ve been lots of improvements in brass instruments over the years.

            Most obvious, of course, was the invention of the valve, which came long after Bach. Indeed, Haydn’s famous trumpet concerto was written for a keyed instrument, something like a cross between a bugle and a saxophone. But, even after the valve, there was a long period of refinement…I have a 1904 Conn cornet that’s a delightful instrument…but, honestly, intonation is quite a challenge. And it doesn’t want to play loud nor high. Today’s cheap mass-manufactured student instruments are as good as or better than anything that was made in that era.

            By the ’30s things had mostly settled down. My C trumpet is from that era, and happens to be one of the more notable instruments…first owned by two different principal trumpeters of the New York Philharmonic. Intonation isn’t quite perfect…but the sound is exactly what I want from the trumpet.

            There are some wonderful instruments being made today. Were I on tour and had something unthinkable happen to my instruments, I’d call up the local music shop and tell them to bring me Yamaha replacements, confident that they’d be “good enough.” I’ve never played on a bad Yamaha, though I’ve never played on a great one, either. A permanent replacement wouldn’t be a Yamaha, but they’re quite reliable.

            b&

  11. Lovely, Natalie!

    Another harpsichordist here, and I’m especially appreciative of your smooth and lithe ornaments! I know Jerry has a lot of musicians in his readership, any other early music folks?

    Maybe a giant toy fly would be a nice teaching tool, helping students keep their wrists quiet and level, hahahahaha.

    1. I know Jerry has a lot of musicians in his readership, any other early music folks?

      I wouldn’t call myself an early music person, but I have dabbled in those waters. And, of course, played all sorts of Baroque and Renaissance music on modern instruments, with at least a nod towards performance practice.

      And we’ve got at least one organist here who’s besotted by Bach.

      b&

          8. No worries!

            TBH, it’s not a bad idea to maybe use some earplugs for those times when you have to practice a full-organ passage with full-organ.

            Most of the time we practice on quiet stops, but at some point you have to practice with the actual combination of stops you plan to use.

          9. One thing I love about organs is their sheer sense of power…the way the vibrations can sometimes be felt all over the room.

          10. Well, actually, I guess it’s the whole dynamic range, which seems so huge for one instrument, that amazes me.

          11. Indeed, it’s a great feature of the instrument — something only brass instruments can match. And, obviously, it takes more than one brass musician for polyphony.

            It’s a big part of the reason why the two go together so well.

            The two complement each other…no single person can do polyphony better than with an organ, and no polyphonic instrument can do monophony anywhere near as well as a brass musician. Put the two together, and you get the best of both worlds!

            b&

          12. Wow, that is beautiful! Thank you, Ben. I’ve saved the link for when I have time to listen to the whole thing.

    2. I got a bunch of early music instruction by virtue of studying organ (at Eastman), but I’m no specialist.

      I agree this this is well-played. Technique looks great! Nice relaxed hands, no flying pinkies!

    3. And Taskin makes three Harpsichordists! Is there a fourth?
      I was thinking the same thing about using the fly with students! 🙂

    4. Well, I’m a recording engineer specializing in early keyboard music, and I have built a couple of harpsichords from kits, and my sweetheart plays (we met through our mutual love of harpsichord music), and I used to play gamba and traverso and about a million renaissance and medieval instruments before I got too busy, so do I count?

      1. Yes, of course! How marvelous! If you persuade your sweetheart to join our ranks, that makes 5 of us which means we could have done a version of BWV 1065 for Jerry. Then of course, we should have a sound engineer!..
        Or else, with your talents as a gambist…
        😉

        1. Have been trying to decide where to insert this comment, here or at #2 above, and have decided on here. A birthday “present” for Jerry: his very own donnybrook on his website!

          Thesis: Baroque keyboard music should only be played on the harpsichord. Bach on the piano should be actively discouraged, if not actually criminalized (drastic problems call for drastic solutions!). Discuss.

          Note: I love piano music, but only from the time of Haydn on.

          1. The thing I love about playing Bach on the harpsichord is that he has so much to say about how to play the instrument. If you are patient and listen to what the harpsichord tells you, Bach teaches you what to do. It’s like discovering treasure when that happens! You know you’re right when the instrument blossoms and sounds rich and beautiful.

            I make my living teaching and playing piano however. My harpsichord experience informs my piano playing in a way that most pianists do not get. My piano students often get very positive comments on their Baroque repertoire.

            The piano is a 19th century instrument that favours a 19th c aesthetic that is really different from the Baroque aesthetic. Playing Bach on piano for me is like playing through wet cement, the piano is so much slower and heavier to respond. I think it’s possible for pianists to play in an informed manner, but I don’t think it happens very often. I would never discourage someone from learning Bach, it’s wonderful stuff! But learn where it’s coming from and learn the style.

          2. Interesting discussion starter. To really get at that issue it seems to me we’d have to think about how we derive pleasure from listening to music. Which may differ from person to person.

            I tend to look at music from a compositional perspective. My greatest interest is what’s happening architecturally or contrapuntally. Performance related issues like tempo, articulation, or timbre, while very important, are secondary. For me. When I do get excited about things like temporal manipulation or articulation or other technical feats it’s because they are being employed thoughtfully in order to better communicate the architecture of the piece.

            So I’d say that the piano’s timbre wouldn’t cause me to reject a performance of Bach out of hand. It might still be a very satisfying performance if you’re concentrating on how the performer is demonstrating insight as to the architecture of the piece.

            NB – none of that is to say I’m tolerant of sloppy technique. It’s just that good technique is the *minimum* a good performance should exhibit. Getting in touch with the architecture of the piece is where things get exciting.

          3. Nice comments, Taskin and m.beef–

            I don’t object to Bach on the piano per se, and I wouldn’t want a pianist to pretend the piano is something it is not. In fact, I would prefer to hear a pianist play the /piano/ rather than try to imitate a harpsichord on his/her instrument, but if I have an objection it is when the expressive norms of romanticism creep into what would otherwise be expressively-played Bach.

            Another interesting thing the harpsichord teaches you is that the piano is a very anti-transparent instrument–the middle register is the most covered and muddied up on the piano, but on the harpsichord it usually is the most cutting and in the forefront. That is one of the biggest differences between them, and the pianist who can achieve clarity in the inner voices of contrapuntal music deserves a lot of praise.

            The other is that harpsichord does not get brighter and louder the higher you play–they get somewhat softer and (depending on the instrument) more singing or bell-like up in the top. This is why, in my opinion, in Bach the climaxes of pieces are not when there are the highest notes, which tends to be the pattern of a lot of later music. Climaxes usually come with chromatic and textural complexity, or for phrasing reasons, rather than something as direct as more notes, higher.

            I’ve been playing a lot of clavichord lately, and that teaches you something else entirely. The pianist Andras Schiff asks his students to play the clavichord, on the theory that the delicate touch of the clavichord is an excellent teacher of control. (He’s right)

          4. Agree about the clavichord.

            I had to perform two clavichord juries as part of my organ degree. Pedal clavichord, no less!
            It definitely forces you to try to exhibit more control. It hardly even speaks unless you touch it perfectly!

          5. I am of very like mind with your first paragraph. I have certainly found that trying to transfer things I do on the harpsichord are frequently achieved in a different manner on the piano.

            I too have recently started playing clavichord! It is a whole new ball of wax. It’s such an expressive instrument and I can feel the enormous sensitivity it gives to the fingers. What repertoire do you suggest?

          6. Whilst I would gladly join this discussion, I wish not to bore our host to tears in his living room on a birthday post…
            musical beef, you couldn’t possibly invite us to continue on your site with a little blog post? Or is that my job to do? (I have never blogged. Wrong keyboard skills.)

          7. Ack! Just seeing this request now.

            I can certainly start a thread for continuing this discussion, if anyone is interested. Just click on my pseudonym. It’ll be the most recent post.

          8. Thesis: Baroque keyboard music should only be played on the harpsichord. Bach on the piano should be actively discouraged, if not actually criminalized (drastic problems call for drastic solutions!).

            Oh, heavens, NO!

            For starters, you’re ignoring all those organ works of Bach that, yes, can be glorious on harpsichord, but are their most pure on organ. The organ is a keyboard instrument, no?

            And, next most obvious, you’re ignoring one of the greatest recordings ever, let alone of Baroque keyboard music: Glenn Gould’s Goldberg Variations.

            Bach himself, I’m certain, would not have been anything even remotely approaching a purist. The organ was his favorite because it was the closest thing he had to a modern synthesizer. His mind would have been positively blown by Walter / Wendy Carlos — and he would have immediately spent the next several years playing with electronics, himself. And he would have been equally thrilled by the various orchestral transcriptions of his works — or even brass quintet transcriptions.

            So…yes, it is essential to know and study (and love!) the music on its original instruments…but it’s just as vital to dust it off and give it a fresh coat of paint in flashy colors that didn’t even exist on the palette back in the day.

            b&

          9. As soon as I clicked send, I realized that someone would call me on the organ being a keyboard instrument. So, let me revise my position to criminalizing only harpsichord music played on the piano 😉

            Yes, the Gould is famous, and wonderful, and… I’d still rather listen to the Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord. I’m not sure if that makes me recalcitrant, a Philistine, a Luddite, a rebel, or some combination thereof.

            As for the rest of your post, I fully agree. Bach was a great innovator, and would have loved the possibilities inherent in the new musical technology. And, I normally have no problem with “old wine in new bottles”. In other words, I agree with you. Without agreeing, if you know what I mean…

        2. Natalie, excellent idea! Skype 4-harpsichord concerto for Jerry’s next birthday. Or another event that is sooner, like squirrel appreciation day, or something.

          HAHAHAHA

          2. It would be cool if you musically talented people did something like that – especially remotely. I think it would be a treat for all of us.

  18. Beautiful piece, Natalie. What a lovely birthday gift.

    Back when I was in college I used to buy classical music albums for $2 at the Student Union and I became particularly fond of baroque harpsichord music. My dorm room had huge windows looking out on a ravine lit by a streetlamp. Sometimes when it snowed at night I would flip off the lights, open the drapes, crank up the volume on the stereo and play harpsichord music as I sat and watched the big, fat flakes come whirling down. It was hypnotic and beautifully eerie.

    Every now and then people would knock on my door and try to find out what the heck was going on. To my surprise nobody ever said “Wow, what a great idea!”

    Instead, they’d gaze for a minute, go “Oh,” and close the door. After a while they stopped investigating.

    In my opinion it is the best way to listen to the harpsichord.

    1. Some of the music I listen to while exercising is Bach organ music.

      I haven’t met anyone else who listens to organ music while exercising. Not even other organists.

        1. Well, I did only say “some”.

          I just can’t get into any pop music. Any style, any genre. When I’m listening to music, that’s what I’m doing. I can’t help it. I’m analyzing it, imagining what it looks like on the staff, thinking about possibilities the composer left unexplored (or that, if I may be permitted to be so presumptuous, would’ve worked better than what the composer actually wrote). 99.9% of pop doesn’t give me much to do in those regards, with the exception of the bit in parentheses.

          Some people don’t like to listen to music this way. They like easy listening, in the broadest sense of that term. I don’t. So I listen pretty much exclusively to classical (small “c”) music. (Which is certainly not to say that all classical music is great. There’s a lot of classical crap.)

          Right now I’m really into Mozart’s Piano Concerto 24 while I bike. It’s beyond sublime.

          2. That’s a big part of the reason why I almost never have anything playing — not at home, not in the car, not anywhere.

            When I do want to listen to something, that’s all I want to do. Otherwise, it’s just distracting noise.

            b&

          4. Is that something peculiar to you as musicians? I am decidedly not a musician; I just like music, and often have it playing in the background when I’m doing other things.

          5. I wouldn’t say I speak for anyone else, even other musicians.

            What I mean is that if, for some reason, great music is playing in the background, it is difficult to resist the demand that it makes of me to become the foreground, and that when I decide to listen to music, I prefer that I don’t have to concentrate on other things at the same time.

            But I can function normally even while good music is playing. I just prefer that listening be a special, meaningful event. The “empty calories” of most pop music don’t really fill that bill. For me.

          6. All that, and…well, a decade or more ago I had been an NPR junkie, and always had the radio on. Then, I went on a trip somewhere where there weren’t any radios. At first, I was a bit discombobulated…and then I discovered that I really, really, really liked the silence.

            I haven’t turned the radio on since then. Not even in the car — honestly, I couldn’t even tell you if the radio works in the car, let alone what station (if any) it’s tuned to. I’ve moved since then, and the radio isn’t even plugged in.

            When I want to listen to something, I’ve got a computer or an iPhone…but that’s not all that often, actually. Mostly, it’s just…silence.

            And, of course, as is the whole point to 4’33”, silence isn’t at all quiet…right this moment, there’s the bacon sizzling on the stove, the refrigerator softly whining, a jet very far in the distance overhead, and the clicking of the keys on the keyboard….

            b&

          8. Nah…he’s on the bed, awaiting the bed’s first sunbeams of the year, which should be right about now…let me check…

            …yup, Sun on the corner of the bed, but cat asleep in the middle. But I just teleported him into the Sun….

            b&

          9. I don’t know if my car radio works or not, since I’d rather listen to the motor anyway.
            I have been known to listen to (selected) CDs in the wife’s car.

            When I take out one of the company cars, the first thing I do after I start the engine is usually hastily to silence the inane babble that the radio is tuned to. The odds of the channel actually playing a song I want to listen to is remote. Sturgeon’s Law applies with a vengeance.

    2. Your combo of harpsichord galore on snow flakes falling sounds absolutely wonderful. I’ll have to try it when we get fresh snow, hopefully in the next days.

      1. Surely good snow-gazing music should include Gleichwie der Regen und Schnee vom Himmel fällt, BWV 18? Or, since snow and xmas get associated with one another here in the northern hemisphere, something from the Weihnachtsoratorium/i>? The sinfonia from the second cantata should be perfect, I’d think.

  19. Happy birthday!

    If you want to treat yourself there’s a great Harmonia Mundi 3CD set by the pianist Alexandre Tharaud called “Baroque: Rameau, Bach, Couperin”.

  23. What a nice piece of music. And a lovely cat. What is better than music and cats?

    Jerry, wszystkiego najlepszego!

  24. What a darling pix with special sweet greeting Toncho et staff provide to you, Dr Coyne ! That (earlier – posted) video of Toncho’s nomming down cucumber slices is (in Billy Crystal – / Pwincess Bwide – lingo) “simply mahverous!”

    Happy New Year !
    Blue

  25. Admission: I was surprised to see a keyboard in the video. All these years I’d been thinking ‘harpsichord’ was just the ‘correct’ name for a harp. You learn something new every day, frequently on WEIT…

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