Master Class

I haven't practiced since Thursday, but think I should be able to today. I typically need a day or two to process after a performance, and I no longer force myself to try until I am feeling ready again. Yesterday my cello-related-but-not-practice activity was attending a master class featuring Matt Haimovitz. A master class is like a public lesson, where usually the student begins by performing a piece or movement of a piece, and then the master teacher chooses elements of their playing to work on for the rest of the allotted time. Yesterday there were four students, and each got 30 minutes.

The program and age/gender of the participants:
(1) 12M Saint-Seans Concerto, 3d mvmt
(2) 15M Faure Elegie
(3) 21M Ligeti Dialogo
(4) 17(?)F Elgar Concerto, 1st mvmt (She wasn't asked her age, but she is also a student of my cello teacher, and that's what I think I remember from studio class.)

Matt Haimovitz is best known for his "concert tour", crossing America to play the Bach Suites in bars. His passion seems to be presenting classical music in non-classical settings. Between that and his youth I admit I wasn't expecting too much, having never seen him perform and suffering from reverse ageism. But he's also a cello professor at Amherst, and studied with Leonard Rose. He knew every piece performed from memory (how do they do that?) and had lots of great advice and good teaching skills. By the way, the class was in a local bar and jazz club, which was much more comfortable than the usual performance auditorium from the audience perspective. It was a fairly large and very dead space, though, which presented an additional complication for the performers, and thus even more opportunity for learning.

I'll post my notes from the class a little later.