This is a piece that I had recently (pre-COVID...) performed this year in Den Haag (Netherlands). This particular version is the first movement (Le Charme) from a set of Concerts (Concert Royeaux and Le Gout Reunis) by the French Baroque composer Couperin, and this particular 9th Concert is a set of movements about the different aspects of Love.

It is a concerts that is for an unspecified treble instrument... so, it can be played on pretty much anything, violin, oboe, flute or whatever... in my case, I thought it would be interesting and fitting to play a piece about love on the Viola dámore! So, I ended up transcribing the piece to the particular scordatura that I personally use for Viola dámore pieces and ended up doing the performance... it's a pretty tricky piece for Viola dámore which isn't the most agile of instruments. I also regret not having recorded the performance as well, so I'm going to try and rectify that with this ongoing Coronavirus isolation project!

Anyway, this is the first takes of the treble line... to which I will need to add the bass line. I'm not sure if that will be a plucked or bowed bass... I haven't really decided, I think that the intimacy of a plucked bass will fit better with the transparent sound of the Viola dámore... but it is a bit debatable whether I will be able to pluck the Viola/Violin with enough dexterity to actually make it sound decent!

This is a work in progress, the completed version will be done in a couple of days when I record and mix the bass line in! The above score is the one that I'm referring to in the critiques.

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Take 1

Bar 1: Could lead further to the second bar rather than getting a bit stuck on the ornament in the 4th beat.
Bar 6: Pretty loud squeak... comes from the low clearance of the Viola dámore strings compared to a Violin, which means it is easy to accidentally touch the wrong strings and have them squeak as they aren't played "properly" to produce a proper tone. It happens... but it isn't noticeable in live performance, just in close recordings!
Bar 7: The motion AFTER the breath needs to move forward... it gets stuck on the first note making it sound a little stilted.
Bar 8: This is terrible, there is no forward direction or intention in the repeated figure... making it sound like a weird stutter. I was worried about the tricky trill coming up, but it is no excuse for repeating a figure over and over in a completely disengaged way!
Bar 11: Likewise here, the climb up from the bottom of the sequence is pretty non-committed and lame, making the arrival point at the start of Bar 12 have the impact of a dropped wet fish. It's not good musical thinking...
Bar 13-14: These long notes are okay, but they could have better internal development.
Bar 15-end: Again... this doesn't really go anywhere.

I guess I can blame this on the first take jitters. I seem to be more concerned with getting the technical aspects of playing the passages and instrument under control rather than playing and communicating musical ideas and character. It sounds like a person saying the right things, but without any meaning and life... hollow. Hope it gets better from here...

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Take 2

Bar 1: Better motion and direction to the main beat of the second bar, this makes better rhetorical sense.
Bar 7: That ending E on the cadence is a little sour in tuning for my taste, it is only a little bit... but it does stick out a little. That said, the continuation after the breath is much better than the previous take.
Bar 8: This is not better. Still directionless... but at least the trill worked better.
Bar 11-12: A bit noisy in hitting the various other surrounding unplayed strings. Not terrible in a live performance, but in a close recording... you do hear it.
Bar 13: Tried too hard to develop this note and it ended up cracking instead. The Viola dámore doesn't support the same sort of weight in the bow as the Violin family of instruments, so the sound needs to be coaxed out in a very different way.
Bar 18: Sloppy shift in the run.

This ended up being a better version than the first take, there are better hints of direction and meaning in the music. However, that also meant that I took a bit more risk on the technical side, which resulted in a few more fluffed notes and accidental touches of other non-playing strings.

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Take 3

Bar 1: Best version so far, direction is good.
Bar 2: Strange timing of the upbeat, not sure why... but it is a bit awkward and not at all fluid.
Bar 5: That was a very hesitant shift up the instrument... and it comes off less than confident in character despite hitting the note.
Bar 7: Good breath, good follow on.
Bar 8: Still not happy with this bit!
Bar 10: Sigh.... family noises!
Bar 11: I am starting to find that the inegal of the notes are starting to sound too much the same in this passage. They should be unequal in timing, but differently so depending on the purpose of those notes.
Bar 13-14: Good development of these long notes!
Bar 18: Sloppy shift again.

Thankfully things are getting better in this third take.... as you would hope! Considering that I haven't played this particular instrument properly for a few months, it appears that I'm regaining some familiarity with the temperamental monster!

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Take 4

Bar 1: Timing is a little rushed.
Bar 6: Out of tune... just a little bit, but enough for me to wince a bit! It was coming, you could hear that there was something a bit unsettled in the playing in the bars beforehand... which meant that there was a slight unease which would mean that something would fall off soon enough!
Bar 8: It develops... but not great.
Bar 10: Noisy other string.
Bar 13-14: These are the best versions of these long notes so far, with a good resolution of the phrase after the development of the notes.

Apart from the first 8 or so bars, I liked this version the best (so far...). The first eight or so bars... I appear to be distracted and not quite fully on point with the playing... not sure, I can't remember if I was thinking about something else at the time... but it sure sounds like it!

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Take 5

Bar 1-7: LOVE IT! This is the way I want it!
Bar 8: It's okay... but I have a feeling that I'm missing the other part to really play off... it's hard to play half a conversation!
Bar 11: It's close to falling off the rails by the end of this bar... thankfully, it hangs in there, but I can hear that it is only just by a thread.
Bar 13-14: It was okay, but better in the previous take.
End: I think this was the best set up for the final note... peace and calm, all the time required!

This was the best version so far, pretty much everything that I wanted was there... or at least mostly there. I can work with this one!

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Wrap Up

In the end, I got the best version in the last take... not always the case, as I often start to lose interest and concentration before calling it a day! It is a danger of recording that you are chasing the perfect version, whilst sacrificing everything that would make it a proper piece of music!

So, I think I will be using the last take as the template with which to add the bass line in the coming days... I still have to decide if that will be with a bowed or plucked Viola, altered to sound like a cello of course! I suspect that a plucked one will sound the best, but I'm not a natural plucker, so I might find that my technical abilities in this regard might not be up to the task... still, I'm going to give it a shot!

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