Essays – Bach | Music | Conducting | Ensemble Direction | Violoncello da spalla | Viola da spalla | Conducting

Bach Methodology

Bach, Blog, Early Music, Essays, Marlboro Music / Koji Otsuki

Since I left the Midwest and moved back to Philadelphia a couple of years ago, I haven’t made music with any period instrumentalists here. In early January this year, I debuted my violoncello da spalla, beautifully built by Dmitry Badiarov, in a concert of Bach cantata BWV 41 with the period instruments, but that was not in Philadelphia— it was in Bloomington, Indiana. I should be networking harder to make early music connections here, indeed, but it isn’t easy for me… It is so true that your networking base and strong connections are developed while you’re in school, and it gets much harder after that. But since I left Bloomington, […]

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I’m still here!

Bach, Blog, Marlboro Music, Random / Koji Otsuki

It’s been more than a half year since I posted the previous blog entry… I don’t know how I let the time get away like this. I still have much to say, and I still love to write when I have the time that I can somehow justify spending for blogging. One big reason I didn’t write during this past summer and in the fall this year (2013) was definitely my exhaustion at Marlboro Music Festival— it was the busiest summer I ever had. Having no true days off for 8+ weeks, and getting no fishing (to me a real therapeutic activity) during the festival season for 7 weeks, seriously

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Selfish self-deprecation

1件のコメント / About myself, Bach, Music / Koji Otsuki

Fairly recently, I had an opportunity to play the prelude from Bach’s cello suite VI on the violoncello da spalla to a small crowd in a modest suburban church. The pressure was almost non-existent; I’d played some cello duets there in the past and I was already familiar with this sanctuary. Not many classically trained musicians and experienced listeners were there. Many of them were just kids…! It was a very good chance to start playing Bach solos on the spalla for someone. I was even going with five full synthetic strings to make some technical elements more forgiving, although my preference to gut strings hadn’t diminished a bit. But

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Looking back at Marlboro Music 2012

Blog, Marlboro Music, Random, Random Thoughts / Koji Otsuki

She is here. She is here, just sitting right next to me. Next to me, in the cozy flowing air. We exchange neither words nor glances— we are just sharing the moment without being a party of two. Physical proximity is the only thing that seems relevant, and yet, the proximity can’t be more irrelevant. It does not matter to me what she is doing here; transcendence and timelessness of the idea of “us” occupy my being. I do not seek nor do I invoke her attention towards me. Her being here is what satisfies me. She does not expect nor does she invite my words towards her. My contentment

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Gamut Bach Ensemble

Bach, Music / Koji Otsuki

In March 2005, I organized a Bach ensemble and performed 4 cantatas in a concert in Tokyo. It was a group consists of the supportive and willing members of Bach Collegium Japan and my friends from Geidai (Tokyo University of the Arts)— I can say it was an ideal ensemble in the realistic realm, or perhaps it was beyond my plausible ideal… In some sections I had those players whom I’d pick for my fantasy Bach ensemble! And despite my shortcomings as a director, we as a team did put together a successful and memorable concert. I believe I had learned and grown as an organizer and conductor through the

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Being Japanese in America

1件のコメント / Essays, Random Thoughts / Koji Otsuki

This country, the United States of America, has given me numerous opportunities to be what I am today: a decent musician (though I do have some doubt about that). It is a blessing to be able to talk about music and occasionally make some music as part of my job, it really is. I wouldn’t have been a musician if I stayed in Japan where I grew up— I wouldn’t even have gotten in a music school in Japan due to lack of the specific knowledge or guidance to navigate through the disciplined preparation process. Well… I might have ended up being a Gagaku musician with no college degree if

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The Compleat Violoncellist

1件のコメント / Bach, Blog, Football, Music / Koji Otsuki

My fixation on the cello playing stems from my fascination with basso continuo. It’s not that continuo part is extremely important in baroque music — of course it is — but what fascinates me most is how continuo playing can dictate the outcome of a whole performance. The leader of the continuo group is like the quarterback of the offensive side of a football team; not only that he/she can drive the whole ensemble forward, but also that he/she can make the soloist(s) perform so much better, in the same way a good QB can make the offensive skill position players play lights-out. My mentor Hidemi Suzuki is, by far,

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Ketchup Talk

Blog, Early Music, Essays, Music / Koji Otsuki

This blog entry isn’t really about ketchup… it’s about vibrato, the intentionally produced pitch pulsation in a musical sound. Why ketchup then? Here’s the story. Recently I saw an image post on facebook by a musician from Germany. It was a picture of a page from a magazine or something, and the page had a quote in large font sizes that read: “Vibrato on every note is like putting ketchup all over the music.” I thought this is a quite good analogy— one that’s as good as it could get. I don’t mind ketchup at all— I just don’t use it as much, but once in a while I feel

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Context

Bach, Early Music, Essays / Koji Otsuki

(Originally posted on February 20, 2011) Fairly recently on facebook, I commented on an online video clip that I watched earlier. It was of an European virtuoso violinist making a recording of Bach violin concertos. In the video this young violinist said: “I love to hear about authentic interpretation and baroque violins; however, we do not know how it was actually played. So the freedom of interpretation is much wider than some people might think. I do believe that I play for the people of the 21st century.” My comment was about this quote that stuck with me… It struck me as too shallow a thought for an established violinist

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Violoncello piccolo da spalla

3件のコメント / Bach, Blog, Marlboro Music, Music / Koji Otsuki

(Originally posted on October 30, 2010) This is a dream instrument for any violinists and violists who want to play the cello. And this is the dream instrument for a guy like me who wants to do Bach cantatas that call for this instrument. It is, for me, a quite essential instrument! Sure, you can go buy a chin-cello to play some cello pieces if you are a violinist/violist. But this instrument has an E string that chin-cello doesn’t have, and it is more like a smaller cello while the chin-cello is just like a huge viola. This instrument is often called the violoncello piccolo [da spalla (shoulder)], or the

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