The main story this week is … resting and recovering from Holy Week, which passed in an intense blur of good music (and a lot of driving). I’ve collected some repertoire highlights here in a Spotify playlist; it’s nice to listen back and reflect now that we have some time. And I’ll be back in the days ahead to edit this post with some notes about several of the pieces. Beautiful stuff.
Working on this past week:
- Practicing: still swamped with upcoming concert music, noodling a little with the Bach 6
- Listening: I’ve been on an algorithmically-assisted hunt for new-to-me baroque music, or new-to-me recordings of old favorites, seeded by some old-to-me recordings of old favorites
- Writing/recording: zeroed in this week on building structure for an old mockup I did of a sort of hybrid rhythmic cello ensemble thing. Fun to develop it further.
On a long kick of reading/watching stories about stories. I think it started last year when I watched White Noise and The Fabelmans back to back. (That was a weird pairing, to be honest.) Recently caught up to The Starless Sea. (Loved it.) And…can I claim Only Murders season 3? (No, maybe not. Funny stuff, though…)
Speaking of long quests, I’m on a glacially slow hunt for the perfect A string for my cello. Larsens are fine but die a shrieking death after 6mos. Versum Solo only lasted 3mos and was a little too bright for me (though people said nice things about my tone, maybe I should sell a kidney and revisit…). Rondo didn’t work for my instrument (though I love that D string). Kaplan was like 97% what I want for tone and playability and lasted a year. Trying a Pirastro next. I’ll report back in like 100 years.
Revisiting Imogen Cunningham. And…from Mark Anthony Fox, is this not the most perfect photograph ever made of a cup of coffee? (Swipe to the 3rd photo–though the portrait is also amazing.)
There’s a pair of doves nesting on our kitchen window sill, so we’re trying not to scare them off (though they don’t seem all that bothered by us).
Working on this past week:
- Practicing: upcoming concert music…upcoming concert music…bit more about that below…
- Listening: I’m obsessed with this harp arrangement of Britten’s setting of the Corpus Christi Carol. It’s a weird carol! Gorgeous, gorgeous setting by Britten. Part of a sort of melancholy winter playlist I’ve been collecting lately, with some lovely chamber music and a few new discoveries.
- Writing/recording: I’ve been on a mission to try to build some systems around my writing and arranging work. There are lots and lots of songs I’ve either chipped away at or worked out for a live gig, but that haven’t seen any final recording or publishing. It’s the kind of work I tend to think of as boring, but it’s fun to revisit some of this old work, and exciting to see a path to getting it out the door. More on that to come.
Since December, my practicing has been swampted by upcoming concert music–and even now there’s a ton of fun music coming up (Brahms piano quartet! several contemporary Latin American composers, Mendelssohn Hensel and Haydn and Dvořák quartets, two musicals, a bunch of orchestra stuff…love it!) But I need to find a new set of music that’s just for me; making practice time for myself feeds a lot of good things in my playing, even when it feels pushed aside by work urgencies.
Last year, I read Agnes Broomé’s translation of Collected Works, by Lydia Sandgren, and I still keep thinking about it. Brilliant, rich book.
There are some connections between all these things in thinking about art as artifact vs. art as experience–and what that means to me as a musician vs. as an audience member (or as a photographer). On the prowl for more good writing there.
Working on this past week:
- Practicing: upcoming concert music, some teaching material, Bach 6 Allemande (full movement)
- Listening: Wispelwey’s Vivaldi Sonatas is, like, a perfect record. Back in heavy rotation around here–as it often is–over these past few weeks.
- Writing/recording: the cello quartet has morphed for now into a fast jazz song for piano trio + strings acting like a horn section…
(…and I really enjoyed this episode of The Treatment, with Branford Marsalis talking about how George Wolfe didn’t want any strings on Rustin..)
I’m finally trying Cubasis, and I’m really enjoying it! Smart use of the touchscreen…and it feels easy to shuffle ideas back and forth between my notebook and Cubasis and the DAW or notation software on my laptop. Good stuff on the go.
Interesting (for all of us bookworms and parents of bookworms): https://www.wired.com/story/taiwan-epicenter-of-world-myopia-epidemic/
Victor Wooten playing Amazing Grace is unparalleled (and so much fun to watch). Revisited it this week to show our kids: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjkFJkbm3vA
Love this: https://www.themarginalian.org/2015/03/02/john-steinbeck-working-days/
Small tech note: I was having trouble with voicemails coming through slowly on my iPhone with Cricket, but going to deleted messages and clearing all permanently seems to have solved it.
Like it (for archiving media backups): https://fastglacier.com/
Important: Tim Harford on “The art of making good misstakes” (sic, haha)
Still trying to figure out which screenings we can catch in between gigs this year, but we’re excited for the Alexandria Film Festival‘s return!
Working on this past week:
- Practicing: upcoming concert music, Bach 6 Allemande (2nd half), some vln/vla/vlc trios with friends (these Mozart K.404a transcriptions of Bach are super cool for how they use the string trio)
- Listening: Musica Antiqua Latina’s “Corelli Bolognese – Trio Sonatas by Corelli and his Successors” has been in heavy rotation in our house (again) this week. Amazing album. https://open.spotify.com/album/3t0DJaxOK0utOV9TpScYxk
- Writing/recording: sketching out a cello quartet
I’ve kicked off an adventure with a used Canon Pixma Pro-10. AMAZING printer. Came with a clogged head that I expected to replace, but I was able to get it unclogged (burning a tremendous amount of ink with the built-in nozzle cleaning process). So…yet more ink and it’s in action! The prints are truly gorgeous — lovely detail and tone and color, rich blacks. Properly archival pigment inks. The danger with pigment inks is that the head reclogs if I don’t use it often enough. Meaning…daily prints! I’m using Moab paper for final prints, but I’ve now ordered a bunch of (much cheaper) Inkpress 4×6 for proofing and snapshots. Lovely stuff.
We had rather a nice evening playing string quartets by the fire at Barboursville Vineyards.
This Vahdam Darjeeling First Flush is DELICIOUS (now that I’ve got my head around brewing it; keeping the temperature at or below 200° F makes a massive difference to the flavor).
Got back into the Gramophone Podcast this week, incl. their episode on Dvořák piano trios. Phenomenal recording.
Interesting: https://petapixel.com/2023/10/06/a-20mp-sensor-in-a-film-canister-reinvigorates-vintage-analog-cameras/
Horrified, as we all are, by the news of attacks on Israel.
Working on this past week:
- Practicing: upcoming concert music; Bach 6 Allemande (1st half) (using the lovely Henle / Reiner Ginzel edition)
- Listening: Spotify “Blues & Roots Rock” playlist: https://spotify.link/QrAd06zMzDb (I first got there via the Amythyst Kiah Artist page: https://spotify.link/NNVbkUIMzDb)
- Writing/recording: recording session prep for a jazz piano trio (Summer Nights…)
So important: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/9/22/jann-wenner-pay-attention-to-the-man-behind-the-curtain
Kind of remembered recently that tea is, uh, amazing! if I treat it as seriously as I usually treat coffee around here. So we got a little teapot from Daiso and a bunch of new loose-leaf green, black, and oolong. It’s been a nice journey and this is helpful: https://artofeating.com/brewing-darjeeling-tea/
Profound: https://www.themarginalian.org/2020/05/17/yes-to-life-in-spite-of-everything-viktor-frankl/
Want it (ASMAC just ran a fabulous program on this with Joe Johnston and Chris Siddall and a bunch of other stars): https://www.chrissiddallmusic.com/store/p105/The_Rocketeer_In_Full_Score.html
This seems nuts: https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220810-derinkuyu-turkeys-underground-city-of-20000-people
Update: it’s out! Hit http://lightofdeparture.com/2022/02/18/nectar/ for streaming links.
Here’s a quick lo-fi track—just slicing and layering some (great) samples from Splice, but I think it adds up to something beautiful, right?
Here’s what I’m working on now:
Mainly, I earn my living as a cellist, performing and teaching. timthulsoncello.com
I also work as a composer and arranger:
- You can find some of my string arrangements on SheetMusicPlus;
- I’m recording and producing music for storytellers via Light of Departure music
- Preview some works in progress here on the blog
I spent a lot of time growing up in my dad’s and his dad’s darkrooms, and I still work as a photographer. timthulsonphoto.com
Sometimes I write software. Mostly kinda old-school web apps to streamline my own work. Github links to come.
I’m hanging out on Instagram, Threads, and Mastodon.
And this, in the interest of transparency, is very important: coffeeonpants.info
Here’s a short rock and roll cue that I still need to master. Reaper and Splice, Surge for the synth bass. Some extra drums programmed via Klevgrand Slammer (lots of fun).
Our 7yo asked me to write him some “mysterious spy” music, so I gave it a day over the holiday break. Fun project! (And he says it’s “too good,” so I think that’s a win.)
Made using Reaper, Spitfire’s BBC Symphony Orchestra Discover, the excellent Orchestral Tools SINEfactory “Rotary” big band library, and the Acoustic Unicorn Series – Skimmer Metall vibraphone from pianobook. Drum loops from Splice. Footage from Storyblocks, stitched together in LumaFusion on my iPhone.
There’s more work later to finish this track and have it library-ready, so I’ll cycle back later for:
- Volume tweaks, especially getting the opening quieter, 2nd section starting louder.
- Add a tiny overlap in some of the string parts for a better legato simulation.
- Add expression to at least some of the string lines (modulation control, phrase dynamics, maybe some eq).
- Create a human tempo map that ebbs and flows a bit with the phrasing.
- Might rewrite the descending cello bit at the beginning —or at least work on dynamics/phrasing
- Proper mix and master
- Check with my orchestration texts or percussionist friends on the realism of the vibraphone chords.
- Tighten up the video edits
And if the weaknesses of one project are inspiration for the next (h/t Joni Mitchell as quoted in Austin Kleon’s Show Your Work!), I’m thinking particularly about melodic writing, drum fills, and (always) writing faster.
Meantime…fun and listenable without being too serious?