Yo-Yo Ma
The cello has often been called the king of string instruments because its range encompasses all four vocal registers. Nevertheless, cellists are always complaining of the comparative paucity of their literature, and feel .
more »justified in raiding more fertile fields. Even Yo-Yo Ma, who has enriched the repertoire by commissioning a considerable number of new works and exploring the native music of different continents, cannot resist the temptation to engage in a little poaching. On this record, he performs four staples of the violin literature in transcriptions for cello, three of them his own. They are linked by their supposed influence on the French writer Marcel Proust and his famous novel, In Search of Lost Time, and take us to early 20th-century Paris, where Ma was born of Chinese parents five decades later. Naturally, the transcriptions do not work equally well. All retain the original keys and leave the piano parts intact; perhaps in an effort to re
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Mid-April doesn’t exactly have the happiest reputation among times of the year. The Titanic sank in the early hours of April 15, 1912 off the coast of Newfoundland, claiming the lives of more than 1,500 passengers and crew. President Lincoln died of his gunshot wounds in the early morning hours of April 15, 1865.
The litany of bad stuff happening mid-April is downright unsettling if not eerie: San Francisco earthquake (April 18, 1906); Oklahoma City bombing (April 19, 1995); Virginia Tech shooting (April 16, 2007); Boston Marathon bombing (April 15, 2013); the fire at Notre Dame cathedral in Paris (April 15, 2019).
And then, of course, income taxes are due April 15 except that they aren’t. The IRS pandemic-extended deadline for filing returns is now May 17.
4:07 pm UTC Apr. 10, 2021
Cellist Yo-Yo Ma, winner of 18 Grammy Awards, recently made news with an impromptu performance at a COVID-19 vaccination clinic in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, where he is a part-time resident. In a March 31 conversation with USA TODAY commentary editor Jill Lawrence, he talked about the role of musicians in a pandemic and how he has shared his own music with patients, families and essential workers in need of comfort. He also shared his determination to stay positive, try to make a difference and approach life with the openness of a beginner s mind.
That is the title of Ma s new 90-minute Audible Original of reflections and performances that illuminate his own life and beginnings.
World-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma treated individuals at a clinic in Massachusetts to a concert after he got his second Covid-19 dose on March 13.
His performance – and the applause he got from his audience – was seen in videos shared by Berkshire Community College on Facebook.
His gesture went viral on Twitter after one Frankie Paris (@fparises) wrote: “Happy Saturday to everyone but especially Yo-Yo Ma who got his second dose at our local vaccine clinic today and played a concert for everyone during the 15 min waiting period.”
The cellist “wanted to give something back,” Richard Hall of the Berkshire Covid-19 Vaccine Collaborative told The Berkshire Eagle.