![]() The seventh chapter is titled ‘Bach at his Workbench.’ It describes in great detail how Johann Sebastian Bach actually wrote his music. ![]() I’m reading a fascinating book by English conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner, titled ‘Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven.’ It is extensively researched, and the all footnotes put together are perhaps just as long as the book itself. I didn’t know it at the time, but the term for a five-pointed implement like this to draw music staves is a rastrum. It is like at least to a small extent, retracing the creative steps that the composer took in writing it him/herself. I guess you can learn this by reading a score as well, but there’s something to be said for the physical act of putting pen to paper. And when you copy out great music, you can’t help discovering what the composer does with his creation, both horizontally and vertically. I learnt a lot from the sheer act of copying and writing out music I familiarized myself with clefs that were beyond the need of my instrument the violin. But in my mind those books were for ‘serious’ stuff, to be used for music lessons, while my hand-made sheets were for fun. One could purchase music manuscript books at Pedro Fernandes, of course. ![]() I used to enjoy just copying out music that I liked I somehow felt ‘closer’ to the music by doing this. Recently while cleaning out a drawer, I came across a blast from the past: it was a crude implement I had fashioned as a child by lashing together five ballpoint refills (with a lot of Araldite as well), to be able to draw five parallel lines to create musical staves on blank paper. ![]()
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