Author Archives: Ryan Libel
This Is Country
I just downloaded Alison Krauss’s new album – Windy City, the Bluegrass Queen’s first release in six years and the first one I’ve purchased (though we do have the Oh Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack). Nostalgia flared as I read Jewly Hight’s New York Times review of Krauss’s new collection of country and bluegrass covers […]
A Conductor at 100
Ed Simons has conducted the Rockland Symphony since he founded it – in 1952. He turned 100 on February 1 and is considered the oldest living conductor. His career in music began as a young child when his father exposed him to classical greats. He took up the violin at age 9, and has been […]
Corelli and Reading Ahead
Arcangelo Corelli was a violinist and composer of the Baroque era, born in 1653. He was active in Italy from an early age, and did much to enhance the prominence of the violin. Wikipedia also reports that his work was instrumental in formalizing the sonata form, and in bringing harmony to violin music. It seems […]
Duets and Moving On
Tuesday’s lesson was a blast – Teacher brought some music so we could play duets. First we did the Seitz 5, the first movement – the movement I’ve been working on as my newest piece for a good while now. The accompaniment part she played is based on the piano accompaniment included on the Suzuki […]
Vibrato Times Two
For two weeks in a row now we’ve zeroed in on vibrato in my lessons. I’ve been working with the technique for over a year now, in fits and starts, and I can’t deny that I’ve made some real progress – but I still have so far to go. This is my mantra with the […]
On Parsing and Pausing
We skipped two lessons over the holidays, so I had plenty of time to practice and make progress on my concerto movement. I think Teacher noticed the progress when we had our first lesson of the new year on Tuesday. During the lesson, we mainly focused on phrasing. She reminded me that with classical violin, […]
Times Gone By – New Year’s 500
Happy New Year! WordPress informs me that this is my 500th post on Musical Me – a milestone, which, when coupled with the New Year, has me thinking big. As I reminisce about 2016, I can’t help but conclude that it was indeed a pretty big year for me personally. I completed my first […]
A Perlman Pearl
Regular readers know that Itzhak Perlman, the 71-year-old violin virtuoso, is one of my favorites. He has been for a long time; I was privileged to get to see him when I was a teenager in the early 1990s, and I’ve got tickets to see him again in April at the Lyric Opera House. This […]
Christmas 2016
We’re just back from our annual trek to Kansas to visit my family for Christmas – we were fortunate to have had excellent weather for the duration – some years, including last, weather has sidelined us into roadside motels as we make our way to and fro’. The rental Explorer performed great and our hotel […]
Late Night Tune-Up
My violin case fell from the seat to the floor of our rental SUV as we made our long annual holiday drive down to Wichita from Chicago yesterday. At our next stop, I opened the case to find two of the strings had loosened, a not-uncommon occurrence for the instrument – in fact it’s possible […]
Ryan Libel 