Volume 23 Issue 3 - November 2017

Beat by Beat | Bandstand
Quartetto Gelato
Musicianship
On Show
JACK MACQUARRIE
What a way to kick off the fall music season. Although I
had often heard of Quartetto Gelato since they first hit
the Toronto music scene 25 years ago, I had never had the
opportunity to hear them in person. Now, here they were almost
on my doorstep, at the classic Uxbridge Music Hall, 15 minutes
from home. If you have not heard of Quartetto Gelato, you have
been missing out on
first-rate entertainment
provided by a very skilled,
classically trained ensemble
with the most unusual
instrumentation of violin,
oboe, accordion and cello.
The group has had numerous
personnel changes since 1992
with violinist and tenor singer
Peter De Sotto being the only
original member still in the
group. Alexander Sevastian,
who joined in 2002, was
the winner of the renowned
Coupe Mondiale International
Accordion Competition in
Washington in 2007. In 2009
JACK MACQUARRIE
they were joined by Colin
Maier on a wide range of
instruments including oboe,
clarinet, violin, five-string
banjo, electric/acoustic bass, flute, guitar and musical saw. In that year
Elizabeth McLellan also joined the group on cello.
With the unique sounds of this instrumentation, and their years
of classical training, the ensemble boasts an eclectic repertoire that
ranges from Brahms, Bach and Weber to Argentinian tangos, gypsy
music and much more. Initially, from my vantage point in the balcony,
I assumed that the accordion was the fairly well-known large piano
accordion. After watching the dazzling movement of the fingers of
Sevastian’s right hand, I realized that this was not the instrument that
I had assumed. It is a rare Bayan accordion where the right hand has
an amazing array of buttons. (For those who might be curious about
the Bayan accordion there is a 30-minute lecture on YouTube detailing
its complexities.)
There was not a scrap of music in sight the entire evening. All of
the shows musical and choreographic intricacies were performed
by memory, with De Sotto switching routinely from violin to his
fine tenor voice. Other than the cellist, who remained on her private
podium, the others were often in movement. At one point, with De
Sotto playing his violin while kneeling on centre stage, Maier put
down his oboe, removed his shoes and socks and began a gymnastic
routine flip-flopping back and forth over the violinist. It turns out that
he is also a dancer and acrobat who spent a time in his career with
Cirque du Soleil.
How does this musical group get away with such histrionic showmanship,
and what does this all have to do with this column? The
answer: first and foremost, is that, for community bands there is
a lesson to be learned here. Quartetto Gelato displays outstanding
musicianship. With the music under complete control, then a musical
group can afford to indulge in showmanship. Unfortunately, in many
community bands, either showmanship takes precedence or remains
completely hidden. Either way, the end result can be a lacklustre show.
Musicianship
What’s the best way for a community band or orchestra to achieve
their musicianship goals? I’m sure there are many ways, but we just
heard of an interesting procedure used by Ric Giorgi, conductor of the
Strings Attached Orchestra. Here’s the kind of email message he sends
to members of his group after a rehearsal: “1. Keep working to make
a difference in the sound of notes according to the staccatos, tenutos,
caps or accents etc they have over or under them. The rhythm was
starting to sound pretty classy once you started playing these. Check
your accidentals and see how far into the section after letter E you can
get. 2. After letter E the arranger throws the melody around in bits to
different sections, so write in (in pencil) the beat numbers and subbeat
‘and’s with vertical lines over them so it’s clear how much you
have to rest between notes as well as how you play when you have
notes. Remember that an accidental affects every note in a bar after
the accidental and any note
that’s tied into the next bar.”
This may all sound very
elementary, but it certainly
doesn’t hurt to honour
the basics.
While on the subject of
Strings Attached, we just
received word of their Young
Composers Initiative (YCI).
In November they will be
performing Cassiopeia
with the 2016 YCI winner
in Orangeville. Last year’s
second-place winner (now
12 years old) has said that
he’s determined to outdo
his previous effort. More
power to him.
Henry Meredith with part of his collection.
A trip to London
Next recent musical journey
for me was a trip to London, Ontario. The first part of this trip was
to sit in as an observer of a class reunion of music graduates from
Western University. While I did not attend this university, it was interesting
to observe class mates of years gone by. Having not seen each
other for years, they soon coalesced into a band and a choir in the
morning and performed on stage in the afternoon. Again: musicianship
at play.
The other part of my journey took me to the home of Professor
Henry Meredith, also known as Dr. Hank, the conductor of the noted
Plumbing Factory Brass Band. Having donated some of my older
instruments to his collection of old brass instruments, I was expecting
to see a large array of instruments including some obscure vintage
items rarely seen in public these days. Astounding would be a better to
describe what I saw. On the ground floor of his house there were a few
instruments. Then, in the basement I saw rows of trumpets, cornets
and bugles hanging six deep on pegs in one section, with larger
instruments in nearby nooks. Then it was off to the two-car garage.
There were two cars in the driveway, but no room for them in the
garage. Hanging all over were framed pictures of town and military
bands from years gone by. How many forms of tubas, sousaphones,
ophicleides and other bass instruments could there be? Then we went
up to the loft over the garage. More varieties of instruments, row on
row, greeted us.
More about all this later, but, in short: I’d say all that Dr. Hank
wants for Christmas is a museum to display his collection of 6.000-
plus musical instruments.
36 | November 2017 thewholenote.com