Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
Back in 2013, I took an extended vacation in Europe, and one of my longer stays was in Vienna. While I was there, I decided to buy a new cello, which I'd been thinking about doing for a number of years.
I gave myself plenty of time to try out a variety of different cellos, and ended up with one that I was quite happy with, as well as a bow that goes very nicely with the cello. Neither was expensive in cello terms, but I could have bought a decent used car for the same amount. From what I can tell, "good," professional-quality cellos start at $10,000 and go up. Mine was well under that. Surprisingly, I ended up choosing one that was basically the cheapest of all the cellos I tried.
Anyway, the point is that I gave myself lots of time to play with different cellos and bows, and was very satisfied with my choice. What I did not do was give myself any time at all to find a case. Obviously I had to have one: I was riding a motorcycle through Europe. The only reasonable choice was to ship it, but I had given almost zero thought to what happened after finding the right instrument.
So, standing there in Herr Ramsaier's shop, I more or less played a game of eenie-meenie-miney-mo, and picked a lovely-looking deep red case which had a price that wasn't entirely shocking. But it was a hurried choice, and one that has recently come back to bite me. I passed over a nice-looking Bam Hightech case as being too expensive.
Fast forward to a month ago. I had volunteered to play in My Dear Miss Chancellor at Annex. I found myself loading the cello in a car, and some of the weaknesses that had bothered me came flooding back. The biggest problem is that the case was a bit small for my cello. Not catastrophic or anything, but particularly around the upper bouts (the shoulders), it had no real space. Any impact would probably damage the cello, with no space for padding to dissipate the energy. Of course, the secondary weakness was literally that: in shipping from Vienna, the cello had actually cracked the case, damaging one of the corners near the cello's waist in the process. Not bad damage, and easily repaired once I was home, but it definitely illustrated the case's problems well. Add to that a suspicious mark on the case that looked like the cello's bridge was rubbing there, and the writing was on the wall (the bridge is the most vulnerable part of a cello).
So, I started looking for a new case. I visited Bischofberger as a very convenient location to the theater, and went through the options they had there. I settled on (ha-ha) a Bam Hightech. Still too expensive, but the shortcomings of the other cases they had made it the clear choice for me.
A week later, I noticed an odd popping sensation when lifting the case, and looked down to see the handle had one of its rivets all mangled-looking and (what it had not been before) visible. Fortunately, Bischofberger sprang into action, and the case will be headed back to Bam for a handle replacement this week.
Part of the process of getting myself in shape to perform publicly (which, if I'm honest, is still some distance away, but whee-ha, big cheap theater!) has had me examining where I'm getting a ton of false notes from. Bad technique, most likely, but I also started to suspect that the at-least-two-year-old Jargar strings that came with my instrument might be a contributing factor. Jargar strings seem to be fine, and I've used them happily for a while, but I decided it might be time to branch out and see what else was available.
Whereupon, more or less, my head exploded. There are so many different types of cello strings available. You can spend $80 for a set, or $500 for a set, and the general advice is to replace them every 6 to 12 months. If you pick the wrong strings, your cello sounds like a dying elephant seal. If you pick the right ones, it sounds like a soaring angel. Practically no one buys a set of four same-brand, same-model strings, infinitely increasing the permutations available. This all according to the all-knowing internet.
For once, no one's advice is worth anything, either. A given string setup may work well for one cello, and be horrible on another. Like, dying-seal horrible. Strings, once in place on a cello, are not returnable. So, it's a giant lottery with multi-hundred-dollar stakes.
So, I did the only logical thing. I found the majority consensus on what constitutes a good set, applied my own internet-researched opinion, and threw the dart. Even now, awaiting some free time, I have a set of Larsen A and D strings, along with a Thomastik Spirocore silver G and a Spirocore tungsten C. The most popular set is the Larsens and the tungsten Spirocores, but based on my playing, I figured the silver G would be a better choice. We'll find out if that opinion was worth anything in a couple months. The Spirocores apparently take quite a bit of playing before they go from sounding like a dying seal to something like angel song.
Just to add to the financial calamity that is keeping up a cello habit, I looked in on Bischofberger's bow selection last night. Of course, the one I liked best was the most expensive German wood bow, and the inexpensive carbon fiber bows felt horrible (my current bow, which I still like better than anything I tried last night, is a very inexpensive carbon fiber bow; no idea what mojo makes it so much better for this cello). It's not as if I need a second bow, but the idea of having a different but also-good alternative is interesting to me.
So now I know that the Jon Paul and CodaBow bows are not the thing for me. Unfortunately, my bow doesn't have any maker's marks at all on it, so I have no idea how to find more information about it. My mom, who is a much more active cellist than I am, made pretty sincere sounding remarks about how much she liked my current bow, so it would be nice to figure out how she could get her hands on one too. (Although, Google image search to the rescue, this looks very similar: Kinglos BY110C, no idea what retailers might carry it.)
This has been your collection of random cello thoughts that have been piling up for the last month or two.
Posted at 12:39 permanent link category: /misc
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater