The Strad: Legendary cellist and pedagogue János Starker dies at the age of 88
I think buried in some of my blogs I wrote how brilliant I think he is! I pretty much compare all cellists' body movement to his when playing cello. It is how I would like to play one day... unlikely, but I can sure try! ;)
He is, without a doubt, the cellist I have watched the most YouTube videos of... and I watch A LOT of videos of cellists! I know some people think he is a bit robotic, but how I see it is: to be that relaxed, and precise in movement and get that sound is just marvelous... and he IS moving around, thank you very much!
I mentioned this in my other blog post, but I like to compare this to dancing. Beginner partner dancers who don't know what to look for (the connection between partners, the steady pulse in the body, the groundness in dancing, the stretch and release, etc) miss all that subtlety and think dancing is boring if it doesn't have aerials or what I call "flash and trash." Really big movement, tricks, aerials or whatever (even if it is not done correctly) because it's exciting and obvious. While the advanced dancers are drawn to the technically sound, subtle dancers.
I'm definitely not saying I'm an advanced cellist, I'm still a NEWB beginner (can't even do vibrato gosh darn it!), but I can definitely recognize and see the precision, relaxedness, ease, economy of motion he executes when playing the cello and I think he sounds wonderful too!
He is just a complete inspiration to me! One day "when I grow up" I would love to have his technical dexterity and ease in playing cello! ...darn it, I really wanted to meet him... :(
His adaptation of Bartok's Rumanian Folk Dances for cello was a complete inspiration for me:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qItXphjWONI
I originally fell in love with these songs as played by Midori on the violin album Encore. The melodic use of false harmonics in the second part is haunting.
Hi Ben,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing, and I totally agree with you!! BEAUTIFUL!! :)
He was my first cello hero and will remain an inspiration for the rest of my life. For me, he is the ultimate smart cellist, which is very under-rated these days!
ReplyDeleteHi Blaise!! :) Couldn't agree with you more! How awesome would that be to have that level of understanding, knowledge & technical facility? I'm sure you'll achieve that in your lifetime!! =p
DeleteI've heard that before "the ultimate smart cellist" - don't remember from who though...
Wonder why it's so under-rated? I would assume the more you know, the more you appreciate, the more passionate you become, which can show through in someone's playing and therefore make them a better player? ..fairly long, drawn out assumptions though - probably why it doesn't work! lol! ;)