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New appreciation for John Williams
In an idle moment the other day, I went searching for tablatures for the classical guitar. I like playing the guitar, but I never learnt to read music, so tablature is sorta necessary for me.
I actually found some. One good site I found was here. One of the pieces available is J.S. Bach's Bourrée in E minor, BWV996 (PDF). It's only one page. It's only 1:15 as played by John Williams (as on this CD). It is also, I might add, a complete bugger to play. I can almost play the first section (once only) in the same time it takes John to play the entire piece. I haven't even started trying the second section.
John makes it sound so easy.
No, wait, that doesn't get across the depth of my feelings on this.
John makes it sound so fscking easy.
Most of the sites which rate the difficulty of the music give this as about 2/3 (ie., 6:10, or 4:6). Oh yeah, he thinks, it's only one page, how hard could it be?
Come back in twenty years, and I might be able to play it almost acceptably.
PS., I once played this album to a person who shall remain nameless, who taught music. He didn't think much of it, because you can hear the squeak of John's hands slipping on the strings every so often. This indicated, apparantly, that John wasn't professional enough. Having experienced what your left hand has to do for even the simplest part of the simplest piece, I am even more dumbfounded than I was at the time.
I actually found some. One good site I found was here. One of the pieces available is J.S. Bach's Bourrée in E minor, BWV996 (PDF). It's only one page. It's only 1:15 as played by John Williams (as on this CD). It is also, I might add, a complete bugger to play. I can almost play the first section (once only) in the same time it takes John to play the entire piece. I haven't even started trying the second section.
John makes it sound so easy.
No, wait, that doesn't get across the depth of my feelings on this.
John makes it sound so fscking easy.
Most of the sites which rate the difficulty of the music give this as about 2/3 (ie., 6:10, or 4:6). Oh yeah, he thinks, it's only one page, how hard could it be?
Come back in twenty years, and I might be able to play it almost acceptably.
PS., I once played this album to a person who shall remain nameless, who taught music. He didn't think much of it, because you can hear the squeak of John's hands slipping on the strings every so often. This indicated, apparantly, that John wasn't professional enough. Having experienced what your left hand has to do for even the simplest part of the simplest piece, I am even more dumbfounded than I was at the time.
Not noticing
Re: Not noticing
At a pinch, if you were to talk about John Williams to most people, they'd either talk about how much they liked his Film Scores, or talk about 'Hey, True Blue', philistines that they are.
I think I would have started vibrating within the first five minutes with barely surpressed fanb0yizm.
The nearest I've come to that was being on the same flight as Bill O'Chee into Canberra. I only saw himn on the way out, though. He was up in the front section (Business Class, I think, the plane wasn't big enough for Business and First classes), and I was way back in the back.
Bumping into Nick Cave on Glenhuntly road a couple of weeks ago was briefly entertaining, though. Like the other people I see around there (There's a comedian named Peter Rosethorn who lives around the corner), it was a case of "he looks familiar. Oh, it's [insert celebrity here], out shopping. Good for him."
Re: Not noticing
> ...you can hear the squeak of John's hands slipping on the strings... This indicated, apparantly, that John wasn't professional enough.
That's a load of old cobblers, and the nameless music teacher deserves to be assigned teaching Recorder to Primary School Kids for a few years. Stringsong is an intrinsic, beautiful and meaningful part of the art of guitar performance.
I bet he hates Shakuhachi Flute, as well.
Re: Not noticing
Re: Not noticing
What a tragic waste!