an Artistic Score Engraving update from June 2024
Dear all,
Welcome back to the monthly update. I don’t know about you, but I just cannot believe it is already June. Things are just moving too fast.
NEWS
It’s always the same…
Ever since I have been teaching to kids (aged 3-18), there has been a single constant: everybody loses their mind in May. Students, their parents, other people around. There is just too much going on and, of course, we private teachers are the easiest target on which to unload everyone’s personal frustrations (after all, we cost much less than a shrink).
We’ve had three student concerts, and they all went surprisingly well for what the premises were. I find it hard, though, to swallow the vanity and ego of people when it comes to these circumstances. One thing is certain: it was not this bad thirteen years ago when I began. Back then, there was at least a semblance of respect for us teachers as human beings.
Just yesterday, I was teaching a 9-year-old kid who’s been my student for 5 years now. He has always been the living definition of the smiling and proud slacker. He basically never practiced or followed a single advice, except on one occasion: public exhibitions! In those circumstances, he comes all gussied up, behaves like a little angel, and performs brilliantly and convincingly, gathering rounds of applauses from the whole audience.
In our last lesson, after 40 minutes spent trying to convince him that Schumann’s Happy Farmer begins up-bow, I scolded him for making efforts only when he needs to leave a good impression on other people1. I’m sure he felt humiliated, and that was basically the point, since I wanted to trigger a reaction from him.
After a while, we were preparing for the orchestra class and, accidentally, an object fell out of my grasp and broke on the floor. Among the general silence, this kid exclaimed: “Ah, ti sta bene!”, which means “Ah, you deserved it!”.
Of one thing I am certain: our musical journey together, as stretched as it has already been, has now come to an end. I just cannot share music with such an epitome of arrogance which, obviously, he must have learned somewhere.
Now tell me: what is your experience with the month of May? If you teach, do you encounter similar issues in this period? How do you face and prepare for it?
The crusade against publishers
Everyone knows IMSLP. It’s a treasure trove of freely downloadable sheet music and recordings. It certainly has its uses, but I wonder if you have ever questioned their morality. Whatever edition you find there has, at a certain point, cost several people a lot of effort, time, and money.
I encourage you to pause for a second and think: is it right for someone to resell other people’s stuff without compensation? I used the term “resell” because either through your subscription or through ads, you’re paying for those scores as well. Just, recognition is not going to whom it should.
I now see certain websites offering services like “learn to navigate IMSLP” or “find more FREE music”, only to gain an insane amount of traffic and, therefore, money! Have they considered that the music they are pointing to would just not be there if there had been no one supporting their creation? Probably not.
I obviously feel this very near to me because I am a publisher myself, but think about it: how would you feel if, suddenly, the fruits of your labour were given away for free, and you would get nothing in return? Would these people learn something if what they do to earn their living would be washed away by automation? I honestly don’t think so.
NEW AND UPDATED EDITIONS
The updated edition for this month is my personal arrangement of the accompaniment part to the Suzuki Violin School, Book 2, for several cellos (2-4). I’ve called it the Cello Orchestral Companion. Its purpose is to make your cellists enjoy accompanying their fellow fiddlers more. You can find it here.
Two new editions were released, a collection of songs for voice and guitar, and an arrangement of a classical sonata for cello and piano.
The first one is Six Songs for voice and guitar, Op. 18, by Justus Johann Friedrich Dotzauer. This edition was created in collaboration with Bernd Krause of Büro für Geschichtswissenschaften, who provided precious insight on many aspects of this edition. You can read a detailed account of this edition here, listen to a couple of excerpts here, and, finally, purchase the full edition here.
The second is a new collaboration with Maestro Yuriy Leonovich. He found a lost arrangement of the fifth sonata from Six Sonatas, Op. 12, original for cello and basso, by Jean-Baptiste Bréval, for cello and piano, realised by Armenian cellist Diran Alexanian, and we made an edition together. This complements our collection of the entire Breval’s production of sonatas for cello and basso (find op. 40 and op. 28 here).
You can listen to an excerpt of the first movement here, and find the full edition here.
Engraving and miscellany
I have several editions in the pipeline, in the form of pedagogical cello duets, more voice, piano, and cello songs, and some piano solo previously forgotten gems. The series on music by living composers will soon see the light, and I can’t wait to reveal it to you.
Engraving-wise, I have no news I can share, apart from having started to work on a short collection of pieces for violin and piano in the heavy contemporary style I was missing so much.
I will not repeat negative things, just go back to previous instalments and know that most things have not improved yet. What is sure is that my dedication and effort has been unwavering, and that I have no intention to falter now.
As the saying goes: “Se son rose, fioriranno!”, which literally means “If they are roses, they will bloom”. I’ve not found a perfect equivalent, just “Time will tell” or “the proof of the pudding is in the eating” (lol). In the end, I am going to use what I learned in Saudi Arabia: inshallah (God willing)!
Thank you!
Bottom Line
Thank you for reading through all this, I deeply appreciate your time and support.
You can join my mailing list here, browse my editions here, and check what’s available for print in the HNE Store. My YouTube channel contains video renditions of most of my editions.
Until next time, thank you.
Michele
- In Italian, we call this “fare bella figura”. ↩
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