Dancing Suite to Suite
Dancing Suite to Suite is the fruition of the search for roots musical and genealogical. I first set foot on my ancestral land of Norway in July 1998. Landing in Oslo, I was greeted by my cousin Jens Moe who whisked me str [+]Dancing Suite to Suite
Dancing Suite to Suite is the fruition of the search for roots musical and genealogical. I first set foot on my ancestral land of Norway in July 1998. Landing in Oslo, I was greeted by my cousin Jens Moe who whisked me straight away to Telemark to meet the hardangerfele player Tarjei Romtveit at his bucolic home in Vijne where we fiddled for most of the afternoon. Lodgings were in a hytte with a sod roof by a rolling stream in Mjonoy where we resumed the fiddlefest the following day.
I had been yearning for a hardangerfele lesson since my childhood, intrigued by the intricately inlaid Norwegian violin with five sympathetically vibrating strings underneath the bridge. Tarjei taught me his favorite tunes, which I preserved on DAT tape for future practice sessions. Jens and I searched for Noekken and other trolls during our midnight hikes in the rustic forest. After several days in Oslo, I made the pilgrimage to the family island near Kragero where I met more cousins, and slept in the same bed as my great uncle Tillman Breiseth had years ago while on vacation from teaching Ibsen at the University of Oslo. I gathered enough Nordic inspiration for the trek to Denmark where I was engaged to play several solo violin recitals at Klint, a community which gathers each summer to study the writings of the Danish cosmologist Martinus. I played the concerts at Klint for an enthusiastic audience.
After the second concert, Ole Saxe invited me to jam with him on drums and piano on any evening after dinner, but I was far too interested in hiking along the coast of Nykoebing Sjaelland at midnight. So our musicmaking did not begin until I received the gift of the score Salsa for Karen in September 1998. The notes leapt off the page, demanding idiomatic interpretation. I learned the gem in a week and it quickly became a staple of my repertoire as an encore, or by adding Nigerian clay pot (udu) played by Ian Dogole during our duo recitals. I was elated to have such a dynamic piece in my arsenal.
Following the suggestions of a friend, I requested an entire suite from Ole Saxe based on the model established by Johann Sebastian Bach: multinational dances related by key comprising an organic whole. Within several weeks Jig for Alan appeared
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