SIC TRANSIT GLORIA MUNDI

Yesterday, the folks in the building in which Susie and I live had a Christmas party and dinner. Although I can scarcely play anymore, I took out my beautiful viola and played a few Christmas carols for the party. I have very fond memories of my viola playing days, about which I have written in past years on this blog.

 

I just learned that the man who made my viola, luthier Marten Cornelissen, died six days ago at the age of 85. He lived in Northampton, Massachusetts and I visited him once after I had bought the viola that he made. I told him how much I loved it and observed that the A on the G string had a particularly resonant sound. He nodded and said that he had noticed that when he made the viola. My bow was made by Benoit Roland, whose shop is in Boston and is a quite famous bow maker (or archetier, as the French say). At one point in his career he was awarded a MacArthur genius grant.

 

The viola and bow were of course much too good for me. When I brought it to show to my teacher, a professional violist, she tried it out a bit and then said “Well, now you have no excuses.”

 

It has been 13 ½ years since I played the viola regularly. The eight years that I studied the viola and played regularly in an amateur string quartet – 2000 to 2008, roughly speaking – were a wonderful interlude. I had studied the violin as a boy and actually was the concertmaster of my high school orchestra, although that is more a comment on how bad the orchestra was than on my playing. But then, with only a few brief intervals, I put my violin away for half a century.  When I returned to musicmaking, I took up the viola because although there are usually quite enough violinists around the violists are scarce. When I listen to a Mozart or Beethoven quartet now, I recall having played it but cannot imagine how I did. To check my memory, I look at my music, which sits on my bookshelves, and there sure enough are all the markings and fingerings that indicate that I really did once play the quartet.