Bit o' Bach's E major concerto on Mandolin!

[fluxman]

Hello,

I've just recorded Bach's E major violin concerto (3rd movement) and made a video and put it on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmDXcKvL6vQ

Gotta love bach!! I'd love to know what you think ...I'll probably record some more soon...although this one took a while since there are 14 seperate tracks haha!

[Shelagh Moore]

I liked it a lot... nice playing and rendition!

[MLT]

Very well done.

[Brandon Flynn]

Very nice. Very clear playing.

[chip]

Nice...got the tab available?

[Woody Turner]

Splendid! The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

[man dough nollij]

Nice...got the tab available?

I, IV, V. Fake it.

[fluxman]

hey all, thanks for your kind comments!

It's a little rusty in places, but the pressure of recording a video of it really helps me develop!

I'm off to work on my next piece

[John Goodin]

It's always great to hear Bach on the mandolin. Very nicely played and recorded, the split screen technique was cool. It reminded me of the old question "what would Bach, Mozart, etc. have done with today's (or tomorrow's) technology?"

Imagine if Bach had been responding to several more centuries of music history when he was developing his ideas. What if he had heard Stravinsky's music, or Hendrix, or Coltrane, or Ravi Shankar?

Of course then you get stuck trying to imagine what those guys would have done if there had never been Bach or Mozart for inspiration.

Anyway, thanks for sharing.

John G.

[Alex Timmerman]

Hello Fluxman,

Great! Thanks for sharing.


Best,

Alex

[SamIam]

Nice job. Excellent video. I liked the split screen for each instrument.

[Jim Garber]

Very nice, emotive and clean playing IMHO. Did you adapt/arrange an existing score for the guitar and bass?

[fluxman]

@Jim Garber.

Thanks Jim. It's funny you mention "emotive", because more than any other style of music i've tried, classical music is the one that totally made me think about simple things like playing quitely, then increasing volume to add intensity...i'd highly recommend anyone learning a bit o' bach simply for that reason alone!

As for adapting the score...The Cello part's lowest note is the low E of a guitar, so it fits perfectly on the guitar....the bass part is just the cello an octave lower (there is no Double Bass in the original). And the viola part also fitted easily onto Guitar.

I've been playing some bach, however, that has a low B on a double bass (so I'd have to buy a 5 string bass to play it..I didn't think baroque music went that low hahah!)

[vkioulaphides]

I've been playing some bach, however, that has a low B on a double bass (so I'd have to buy a 5 string bass to play it..I didn't think baroque music went that low hahah!)

Curious... after three-plus decades as a professional bass-player, I have NEVER seen that low B in Bach... (And, mind you, I play in a virtually ALL-Bach orchestra that accompanies a Lutheran choir.) Are you SURE you mean the sub-contra B, i.e. the one written below the second ledger-line BELOW the bass-clef staff? Yes, that note DOES appear in the works of Richard Strauss (notably in Zarathustra), and in those of other, post-Wagnerian symphonists. Yes, THOSE parts are meant for the (modern) five-string bass. But Bach?!? I am very curious...

If, on the other hand, you do find that low B, please assume that the part you are reading was meant to be played on an "at pitch", 8-ft, NON-transposing instrument. Early works, those from the Arnstadt and Muehlhausen periods of Bach's work, plus some of his "Gallic" scorings, such as those from his stint at Coethen, were written for non-transposing violone. Such a note, as you say yourself, is NOT meant to sound yet ANOTHER octave lower!!!

But let me not bore you with all this here. If you want to bore yourself there are tomes, and tomes, and TOMES of dissertation-depth materials on this subject. Caveat lector, as always.

Cheers,

Victor

[fluxman]

It was a while ago and I can't remember what bach piece made me think "i'd need a 5 string bass" (it may not have even been bach...but I havn't really learned any songs from other composers yet)......i may be just confusing it with a cello part that was a lower B...or the harpsichord part that I tried arranging for bass...

either way..gotta get me a 5 string mandobass hahah..mandobasses..surely the most ridiculous looking instrument ever?

[vkioulaphides]

Indeed, Bach's bass-parts (GLORIOUS are they are!) can also be a bit confusing. Yes, some of them were written for the German violone, which may in fact have 5, or even 6 strings. That string-bass, however, is a NON-transposing instrument, so that "what you see is what you get": NO extra octave further down, sound-wise.

I seriously doubt that a low B would be found in a "tutti", generic cello part; that instrument's tuning has settled historically to CGDA for quite a while-- even though one of Bach's Cello Suites IS in fact written for an "unorthodox" tuning. It seems that everything comes with an "on the other hand" qualification..

Such a low note on the harpsichord would be a much more likely find-- presumably a "grand", dual-keyboard French clavecin. In any case, you should feel free to apply "octave displacement" --musically, of course-- whenever and wherever you need to. Hey, Bach himself did so, all over his scores, especially in his bass parts, as the instruments "ran out of notes" vis-a-vis the "compositional", abstract voice-leading.

Cheers,

Victor