Sunlight

I've recorded a new piece! It's a short sad cello solo called 'Lament'. The composition itself isn't really new: I wrote it way back in 2001. However, I never managed to record it to my own satisfaction and thus never published it online. After all these years I've now finally managed to make a recording that I'm happy with. It's not perfect of course, but I finally dare publish it and share the sheet music. In case anyone wants to give it a try, here's the sheet music: Sheet music for cello solo I found another recording I made of this one from 2010. I wasn't happy with it back then and indeed, listening to it now makes me realise that I did get quite a bit better at recording my cello since then. Part of that is in technique, like having a better microphone, using a clicktrack and stitching together recordings to combine the best parts from several recordings. But I can also hear that I have more control of my cello now: especially my vibrato g...

I've composed and recorded a new song! :) It's called The Master Waits and it's a duet for either two cellos, or viola and cello. Here's a recording: I'd be honoured if anyone else were to play this (not that I expect many cellists read this blog ;) ), so here's the sheet music: Cello + cello Viola + cello This composition came about when I was improvising a bit and discovered that you get a pretty cool sound if you pluck the open C string at every beat and then add various chords on top of that. I had so much fun with that that I decided to write a composition around this idea. :) Initially I thought this one was pretty easy to play, but it turned out to be really hard to get the pitch exactly right for all of those chords. Keep in mind that unlike a guitar, a cello doesn't have frets, so if you're finger is only 1mm off, it already sounds bad. There's quite a lot of dissonance here (on 0:19 the plucking part even plays G and g# together) which is a...

I've made a new song! It's an instrumental track that features a lot of cello, in combination with vocals and digital instruments. There's more cello here than you might realise: the eerie scratching sound at the beginning and ending is also cello! :) Normally as a cellist you wouldn't want to make a sound like that, but here it adds to the atmosphere nicely. This sound is achieved by slowly playing on the open G or C string, too close to the bridge while applying too little pressure. The cello solo at 1:57 has distortion applied to it, making it sound a bit closer to an electric guitar than a cello normally would. I've made sheet music for the cello part, and a recording of the song without the cello so that it can be played along to. The result is quite different from any other cello music I know and I find it quite fun to play along to. Here it is, in case anyone wants to give it a try: Cello sheet music Recording without cello, for play-along The vocals towards ...