Geoffrey Dean
Violoncello Without a Master: Alwin the Auto-Didact
Alwin Schroeder’s status as a self-taught cellist gained widespread notoriety from at least as early as 1885. That year the Leipzig...
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Geoffrey Dean
- May 1, 2022
- 6 min
Have Cello, Will Travel: Alwin's Toothbrushes
In the late 1890s, Alwin Schroeder and his family spent their summers in the Rangeley Lakes region of Maine. In her book The Islanders,...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Apr 10, 2022
- 5 min
Telo-melo Cello: Step-Child of Gasparo?
My recent post on cello poetry brought to mind the writings of Robert Haven Schauffler, who studied cello with Alwin Schroeder at...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Mar 23, 2022
- 7 min
Alwin Schroeder's Bach Cello Suites Edition
Alwin Schroeder's 1888 edition of the Bach Cello Suites is often overlooked in the literature on the suites. I believe it deserves...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Mar 5, 2022
- 2 min
Bulgarian Rhythms: Lyubomir Pipkov's Spring Caprices
Listen to Five Spring Caprices by Pipkov, arranged for cello and piano by G. Dean In Bulgaria, the month of March is named after Baba...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Feb 5, 2022
- 3 min
More Cello Verses: Sonnets and Songs
As on most days, today I was answering the ever-present question of “who WAS that cellist?” when my query results led me off in another...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Jan 31, 2022
- 7 min
19th Century Cellists in the US: Frederick Bergner
Listen to my performance of Bergner's Reverie Best known as the first cellist of the New Philharmonic Society for 47 seasons, Frederick...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Jan 16, 2022
- 6 min
19th-century Cellists in the US: Theodore Ahrend
Born in Germany in 1829 or 1830, cellist Theodore Ahrend studied in Brussels, where he may have worked with Francois Servais./1/ In 1849...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Jan 8, 2022
- 2 min
The UNC Greensboro Cello Collections, in Four Haikus
Before the winter break I spent a few days among the Cello Collections at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Although I have...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Dec 4, 2021
- 6 min
US Cello Performances, 1891-2: An Annotated Timeline, Part 2
See Part 1 here January 1892 9 Liederkrantz Hall, NY Anton Hekking among the solo performers on Liederkrantz 45th...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Nov 24, 2021
- 5 min
US Cello Performances, 1891-2 Season: An Annotated Timeline, part 1
The 1891-2 season, Alwin Schroeder's first in the US, saw an extraordinary convergence of musical talent in this country, and the...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Nov 14, 2021
- 1 min
Hugo Becker's Love Scenes, Op. 7
Liebesleben (Love Scenes), a "little suite" for cello and piano, was published in Liepzig by Max Brockhaus in 1894. I discovered it in...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Oct 30, 2021
- 6 min
Bel Canto Cellists: Cesare A. Casella pere et fils
Listen to my performance of Chanson Napolitaine by C. A. Casella fils A second-generation member of an Italian cello-playing family,...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Oct 23, 2021
- 1 min
"Soak 'em": Thomas Edison's Advice To A Cellist
The following anecdote in an item from the Lewisburg (PA) Chronicle (Oct. 15, 1891, p. 3) concerns an Edison engineer who was also a fine...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Oct 16, 2021
- 1 min
"Sing, Cello Sing": Jane M. Mattingly's "The Cello"
In the early 1920s the Willis Music Company of Cincinnati, Ohio, published A Happy Journey for Little Fingers, a set of six Practical...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Oct 9, 2021
- 3 min
Schroeder Student Spotlight: Hugo Schlemueller
One of Alwin Schroeder’s students at the Leipzig Conservatory was Hugo Schlemueller (1872-1918), the son of a Leipzig music critic. There...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Oct 2, 2021
- 1 min
Encore: More Music by Hermann Heberlein
Listen to the first part of Heberlein's Concertstuck, Op. 8 Heberlein and other cellists performed this work in Detroit during the 1890s....
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Geoffrey Dean
- Sep 25, 2021
- 4 min
Sounds of Bulgaria: The Music of Lazar Nikolov
It was a world beyond anything I had yet experienced or imagined. When I recall it, the sounds come back to me first. I hear the...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Sep 22, 2021
- 3 min
On This Day in 1891: Schroeder Arrives in the US
Listen to David Popper's Adagio, Op. 65, No. 1, published in 1891 and dedicated to Alwin Schroeder 130 years ago today, Alwin Schroeder...
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Geoffrey Dean
- Sep 11, 2021
- 2 min
Bel Canto Cello: Adrian Bradbury Plays Piatti's Opera Fantasies
Bradbury and Davies perform Piatti's Fantasy on Bellini's La Sonnambula British cellist Adrian Bradbury’s 2020 2-CD release of Alfredo...
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