Upbeats: Season 4, Episode 17 (Braving the Musical Zoo)

With the unusual pairing of a recorder and accordion coming up in a concert, Jon and Haz do a quick survey of other rarer concert instruments. In this 'musical zoo' are instruments that are both haunting and hooting, folk and electronic, and one that reminds Haz of a 'depressed Cor Anglais.' 

Transcript

Arts Active Podcast

Transcript - Braving the Musical Zoo

JJ

Hello, my name 's JJ.

Haz

And my name’s Haz. 
 JJ
 Who has come all the way down from Glasgow as ever.
 Haz
 I've come a long way and you've come from upstairs to downstairs so you've done very well as well. 

JJ

Well, you win, it's a veritable poddy pilgrimage that's why I'm calling it.

Haz

Thank you so much Jonathan James.

JJ

What did you listen to on the way down?

Haz

I would love to say something like really deep meaningful, like sonatas or tone poems.
 
 JJ

At least come Mahler. A Mahler Symphony. See you through. 
 
 Haz
 
 Mm. True crime. All the way. I want to be scared and alone when I'm driving those two things in that order just to keep me awake because otherwise the seven and a half hours of dirge.
 
 JJ

Yes I suppose it would keep you awake. I'm slightly concerned about the quality of your driving when listening to true crime but better that perhaps than heavy metal.

Haz

Well and then I would be just crashing into things for no reason so, I mean, at least if I'm driving on both sides of the road I'm still awake.

JJ

Yes, that's a good start. Both… hang on… 
 Haz
 Ha ha! Sorry.
 JJ
 We're going to move on to the subject of our podcast which is The Musical Zoo.

Haz

Mm-hmm.

JJ

We are looking at rarer instruments, not so rare that they're actually extinct but instruments that grace the concert platform but not that often, you really have to try hard to see them.

Haz

Like little unicorns it’s like you're like “oh I've heard of them I've not seen one myself are they dangerous?” like, you know.

JJ

They could actually exist. It's a little bit like those zoo exhibits where you go and you're just staring at a rock because the snake is having a siesta or something and you think “Is there anything there? Where is this insect? Where is this thing?”

Haz

Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

JJ

Yes, zoos can be underwhelming, but not this podcast.

Haz

No, never. This podcast. And also we've got some really weird and unusual techniques as well as instruments today which I'm looking forward to.

JJ

Techniques of playing them, yes, that's true. And we're going to go from the more familiar end to the rarefied end.

Haz

That's what I'd like to do in my life as well. So we're starting with… 
 JJ
 The recorder. 
 Haz
 Yeah. Which is not that rare.

JJ

It's not rare in terms of it's part of our school lives.

Haz

Be kind. I can see you're trying to be like “It's a lovely, lovely instrument with…”

JJ

Look, let's just get the stereotype of the descant recorder, sort of, making our ears bleed out of the way.

Haz

Shrill, squealing tubes of death.

JJ

Is one way of putting it. Musical purgatory.

Haz

Yeah, that's,I mean, it's some kind of punishment to bring into a classroom, a bucket of bleach with 30 recorders in. Hand them out to the naughtiest pupils and then say “Right here we go.”

JJ

Who came up with that thought? Do you know I'm going to hand 30 small kids the shrillest instrument known to humankind.

Haz

I think it was the devil. I may be incorrect with that my history is not perfect in that sense.

JJ

It's a strange pact that we've missed out on, but, look, we've got that out of the way because, in all seriousness, this was actually prompted by the fact that you will hear the recorder in all its glory together with an accordion on the stage of Eglwys Dewi Sant, a beautiful church in the middle of Cardiff.

JJ

And this duo will be performing on the 1st of April and is Tabea Debus on the recorder, I should say recorders because she brings a whole family of recorders from soprano through to contrabass.

Haz

Oooh! Amazing.

JJ

Actually I don't know if she's bringing the contrabass, which is a very weird instrument, to this particular concert, but anyway she will be joined by Samuele Telari, a wonderful Italian, on accordion.

Haz

Amazing. So, kind of, that's a… OK, it sounds rude, but did they pick those instruments out of a hat? How did they…?

JJ

It's a rare combination.

Haz

Yeah, it is.

JJ

They met on the, I think it's a young artists trust programme and you can hear more actually about the relationship and about how they work together and how they choose their pieces on a bonus episode that I've recorded - Isn't that special? It's so exciting -  with these two artists. So do look out for that, but I thought we could just first of all get into the proper sound of a professionally played alto recorder. Here is Tabea Debus, who is playing along with lute this time - a guy called Alon Sariel. And they're playing part of the Passacaglia by Heinrich Franz Ignatz Von Biber to give his full name.
 
 [Music: Heinrich Franz Ignatz Von Biber: Passacaglia. Artists: Tabea Debus, Alon Sariel]

Haz

Bless you. Wow, it's beautiful.

JJ

It's such a mellow sound when played by someone like Tabea Debus, who I think is one of the best exponents currently on the concert platform. She's such a special talent.

Haz

Yeah, it sounds like someone singing or just lah-ing along with the with the alto recorder. It definitely doesn't sound like how I remember it sounding from. I think that's the preconceived sound we will have in our heads.

JJ

It is much more like a baroque flute, isn't it, in that sense

Haz

Yeah.

JJ

And it has that fluidity and that level of just, delicious expression and so sensitively accompanied by the lute. And you might ask, well, how's that going to work then, with accordion, because accordion is obviously a different beast.

Haz

Yeah, quite a bit louder and the sound’s more direct, isn't it? When you when you press down on the note, it's like “bah” straight away.

JJ

It is. Very reedy. So we discuss that in the bonus episode.

Haz

Yeah.

JJ

So that's my starter for ten. 
 Haz

Beautiful.
 JJ
 Let us continue our foray of exotic instruments. 
 Haz
 OK, so I'm going to go down the same line of… you may have seen it before or it's got cousins or family that you may have met before. I'm going to go for a harmonium.

JJ

I love the harmonium.

Haz

Yeah, I'm making eyebrows at you to explain what a harmonium is so that I don't have to but… I don't want to get it wrong.

JJ

You've got Google open in front of you. You should do this.

Haz

Stop spilling my secrets. I, anyway, I put my phone…
 JJ

A quick look behind the curtain there.

Haz
 Yeah, pay no attention. So, a harmonium I believe is a keyboard instrument that you pedal with your feet and with bellows, which means the air goes, thank you for nodding, air goes through the instrument. So, it's kind of a reed instrument, kind of a wind instrument. But you play it with your hands like a piano.

JJ

Often seen and found in churches from the 19th century and beyond.

Haz

That…  Beautiful. Exactly. So, the example I've gone with is actually from the Penguin Cafe Orchestra, because this is a track called Music for a Found Harmonium. And the story is that Simon Jeffes, who created Penguin Cafe Orchestra, was on tour in Japan, went down an alleyway, as you do in Japan, and found this harmonium, started playing some…
 JJ
 No way.
 Haz
 And it was a very haunting sound. And the sound you get at the start of the track of that airy, sort of, chords coming through, it's just both haunting and quite musical as well. It's yeah, you can make it sound lively and jolly, or you can make it sound sort of surreal and ethereal. So yeah.

JJ

And then it gets into this lovely ostinato pattern, doesn’t it.
 Haz
 Yeah.
 JJ
 And. I think it's interesting that the harmonium has made a bit of a comeback outside of the walls of the church and is being used increasingly as a folk instrument.

Haz

Yeah, that's what I love about it. It can sound quite chipper and quite… because it sounds almost a bit like a hurdy-gurdy, which is one I was going to go for today, but didn't…

JJ

I think harmoniums are very versatile. They can sound quite melancholic, can't they, just by the tone, but the way the Penguin Cafe uses them is beautiful. Let's have a listen.
 
 [Music: The Penguin Café. Music for a Found Harmonium. Artists: The Penguin Café]

JJ

I love how you can hear the keys clacking away there.

Haz

Yeah. It's like you're sitting next to them in the room. It's great.

JJ

It's very direct and involving that recording, isn't it? 

Haz

Mm-hmm. Yeah. 
 JJ
 And such a gentle sound.
 Haz
 So that's gentle. Whereas we said about the accordion, it's less gentle.

JJ

Well, yes. Now let me tell you about the accordion Haz, because I have been doing my due research on this one.

Haz

Yeah. OK, right. And not a phone in sight. He actually knows this.

JJ

So there are two main types of accordions. There are diatonic ones and chromatic ones, and the chromatic ones are, in turn, either piano ones - you have a piano keyboard, or you have purely just buttons where the piano keyboard would be, together with the harmony buttons on the other side.
 Haz
 Right.
 JJ
 Then you have about 27 other variations of accordions that all belong to this vast genealogy of bellow keyboard instruments and they include the bandoneon, which we've talked about in the past in the world of Piazzolla and tango, the concertina, the Cajun the harmonika.

Haz

Oooh, no.

JJ

Now this is, I should say, the harmonika spelt with K, so this isn't the mouth organ. 
 Haz
 OK, good. OK.
 JJ
 This is something different. And the schwyzerörgeli

Haz

I beg your pardon!

JJ

and all sorts of weird and wonderful instruments. But the one that will be played by Samuele Telari, together with Tabea on the 1st of April, let me just put that out again,

Haz

Mmhmm.

JJ

will be the keyboard variety and it's capable of all chromatic notes, 
 Haz
 Wow.
 JJ
 and it is highly expressive. I mean when I say to you ‘accordion’, what do you think about? What is the stereotype? You're giggling already.

Haz

No, I would just think, like, an evening, there's a café, and someone outside is like “braa, bah bah bah…”

JJ

And where are you? You're in…
 Haz
 France.
 JJ
 of course. Paris.

Haz

Is that OK? Is that yeah. Yeah, I did. That's what I think. But actually…

JJ

It's the language of yearning, of melancholy it. Yeah, it has that quality, doesn't it?

Haz

Yeah.

JJ

Of just longing for something I feel, and either that or, I suppose I think of a sailor's hornpipe or something.

Haz

Yeah, it's either really jolly, like tap dancing or like the cigarette “It is what it is.” Just like playing outside the cafe. I don't know. Those are my two stereotypes.

JJ

I love that and I think that's probably pretty common to us all. So it was with great interest that when I was studying in Germany doing conducting over there that for the first time, we're talking Haz, ahem, 30 years ago.

Haz

Ah ha! I don't believe. It.

JJ

And in the corridors, for the first time, in my sort of mid-20s, I was hearing an accordionist play Bach and in German conservatoires accordions have been a big thing, very serious, earnest looking accordionists, wearing cardigans, learning three-part counterpoint.
 Haz
 Oh.
 JJ
 and, yeah, learning Bach. And this has been a thing, I think more so now in the UK and beyond, but certainly Germans have been onto the case for quite a while. 
 Haz
 Wow. 
 JJ
 So I just thought I'd give you a sense of what the classical accordion could sound like with this. Lovely final paragraph from Bach Fugue in G Minor. It's called The Little Fugue and it gives you a sense of the power and range of the instrument.
 
 [Music: Bach: The Little Fugue from Fugue in G Minor]

Haz

Wow, that's so versatile.

JJ

And you predicted the Tierce de Picardie - the nice resolution and the major at the end.

Haz

Yeah.

JJ

I don't know why it's called the Little Fugue there. There's nothing...
 Haz

No, that's huge. 
 JJ
 It's a powerful sound. What were you thinking?
 Haz
 I was thinking I can't believe that this isn't being played with two hands and two feet, like on a big organ, because it sounds big and I also can't believe that it's able to do so many dynamics.

JJ

Yes, it is… I mean, first of all, it does a good stab at the big pedal range, doesn't it, on the organ.

Haz

Yeah.

JJ

And yeah, it's a huge… Now, here's a telling thing, I'm interviewing, I think she's called Ksenija Sidorova, who is a Latvian accordionist, as it happens, on Friday.

Haz

Wow.

JJ

She's over with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in Bristol. And she calls her instrument The Beast.
 Haz
 Nice.
 JJ
 Because it can make a massive sound.

Haz

Yeah, I think it's worth going to see this concert anyway. I'd love to go see it just to see how a person moves around an instrument like that and to see… because it's probably one of those things that they look really calm, but everything is going on, like fingers and toes and everything, like.

JJ

A lot of coordination, and I think you'd need a good session of physio after playing.

Haz

Yeah, yeah. You just be really aware of your body. 
 JJ
 Yeah. 
 Haz
 Like, to be around the instrument.

JJ

It's a heavy instrument and you have to embrace it and have a large reach, you know. So, a little insight into the world of both recorder and accordion and we've done harmonium so far. What's next?

Haz

Amazing. OK, so now taking a stroll through the zoo, we take a wrong turn. We find ourselves on the back alley of somewhere. We're not sure if we're allowed to be here, but we see at the duduk. 
 JJ
 Do we?
 Haz
 We do. The Armenian oboe.

JJ

Ha ha! I love a duduk.

Haz

What's not to like about a duduk? I think it's one of those things that you hear and, like, you don't know what it's called but you've heard it before.

JJ

Yes. Now you've been playing with things like duduks recently haven't you?

Haz

I really have been playing with things, like…

JJ

Such a professional.

Haz

I know! Available for all of your or mediocre gigs. So a duduk is actually featured in Karl Jenkins's Stabat Mater, and it's also used in film music, and I've chosen one that I played recently, which is by Harry Gregson-Williams because this is the Lullaby for Narnia, and this instrument was chosen because it sounds otherworldly and to our ears, who are used to, you know, four beats in a bar, boring old, I don't know, flute – can I say that?! I don't know! It's chosen a duduk, which sounds mystical and magical and just something slightly more removed from what we're used to hearing.

JJ

Again, there's an inherent sadness, I think, to the sound of a duduk. For me anyway. 

Haz

Yeah, it's, like, haunting. 
 JJ
 Haunting. That's a good word.
 Haz
 It's like, yeah, like if a cor anglais had, like, just a couple of drinks and got real sad. And they’re just at the end of the bar and they're like “I was happy once.”

JJ

That is brilliant. 
 [Music: Harry Gregson-Williams: A Narnia Lullaby.]
 JJ
 I'm definitely somewhere in the Middle East with that.

Haz

Yeah, it's cool, isn't it? Or in Narnia, being serenaded by Mr Tumnus.

JJ

Or was it Armenia?

Haz

Yeah, it was actually Armenia. Well done. Bringing it back to the fact. And apparently, and I plucked this from my own knowledge and not from Google, there’s evidence of the duduk’s use as early as 1200 BC.

JJ

Really?

Haz

That's quite a while ago, isn't it?

JJ

I wonder what they sounded like back then. I bet you not quite as melodious as what we've just heard.

Haz

No, but still, I mean they’ve lasted the test of time, haven't they?

JJ

They really have and I'm going to keep in the world of folk instruments and it has to be said that most divine instruments so far, barring perhaps the harmonium, have been, I suppose they have their main foothold in the world of folk music, right? 
 Haz
 They do.
 JJ
 That's where we… that's their natural habitat.

Haz

Yeah, you wouldn't find them in the middle of an orchestra usually.

JJ

Not. Usually even the recorder has its roots in troubadours and trouvères, who in the mediaeval period would go around reciting or recording to use the old French, old tunes, so ‘récordé’ back then meant to recite a memorised piece so they were recording tunes in that way

Ha

Hmm. That's very cool. 
 JJ
 and that's the root of the name. I thank Tabea Debus for that.
 Haz
 Oh, good one.

JJ

So, I'm going to go for the cymbalom.

Haz

Right, which I definitely know what a cymbalom is.

JJ

Is you definitely do, do you?!

Haz

Yes, which is… but I would like test you.
 JJ
 Oh good. Good. Well... 
 Haz
 So tell me what you think it is.

JJ

I think it's from the family of dulcimers, which are these table top, sort of, strung instruments that you beat with beautifully delicate, padded beaters, and that you have… it's kind of a little bit like a chopstick, you know, in terms of the width of the beater but you have to hold them between your front two fingers. And this is quite an interesting hold on beaters.

Haz

Yeah. Ah.

Haz

And you bang them like ‘dang, dang, dang, dang, dang on them.

JJ

That's it and you have this, kind of, tremolo effect where you go ‘da ge da ge da ge da’

Haz

It’s doing like a rippling effect.

JJ

Like that, just to get a sustained note. We've heard it before. In fact, we've played it before on this podcast when describing the theme tune from the latest Sherlock Holmes series.

Haz

Perfect. Yeah, I knew I. Yeah, as soon as, yeah. Anything to do with, like, film. It's also used in Lord of the Rings, I believe, when they're doing anything that's, like, towards the East.

JJ

Yes. So this has an Eastern European feel, but also just using your word again, it sounds immediately haunting, I think.

Haz

Mhmm.

JJ

Either that or it can add this lovely, clattering, joyful, sort of, ring of sound to the note. So I think the most celebrated example of it in the orchestral repertoire is by Kodály, who, by the way, isn't the only composer to have used the cybalom. Stravinsky, Dutilleux. Andreessen, Kurtág, so quite a lot of modern composers, have reinvented the sound of the cymbalom for their own purposes. But with Kodály it comes up in a more authentically traditional way and he uses it for his Hungarian Háry János suite.

Haz

OK.

JJ

Here's what it sounds like.

[Music: Kodály: Háry János Suite. Artists: Japan Friendship Philharmony, Atsushi Takahashi, Junko Sakimura]

]

Haz

It's interesting how that can really cut through the texture of the orchestra.

JJ

Yes, well, I have cheated a little bit because I found this recording on YouTube where, for some reason, the cymbalom was front and foremost on the stage and was marked accordingly as a solo instrument.

Haz

Nice. Great. Why not? 
 JJ
 Why not? 
 Haz
 But it has such a more… it’s like a thinner, reedier sound to the… it's not… because it's not plucking. It's not like a harp where you, like, ‘dommm’ it's like a ‘dang’.

JJ

Yes, I love the feathered quality of the beaters. They're very light, and they just, sort of, dance across the lap. And then you have the resonating chamber. The soundbox itself is quite shallow, I suppose. So, it's both a light sound, but also it's able to cut through, as you say, it's very bright.

Haz

Mmhm. Yeah. It definitely affects the texture, so I think all these composers like Stravinsky and stuff like experimenting with texture and things like that. It's a great instrument to use.

JJ

It sounds to me like almost like a folk harpsichord.

Haz

Yeah, that's it. That's it. Yeah. 
 JJ
 In a way.
 Haz
 It's in the weird part of the zoo. We haven't quite... They haven't been fed recently.

JJ

No, well talking about our zoo tour, where are we going next?

Haz

OK, so this is my final offering for you. Now this is not an unusual instrument, but I've chosen an unusual technique. 
 JJ
 Mmhm.
 Haz
 Well, it was for me. So recently I had some orchestral work, which is amazing because if you've ever heard me play, I should not be getting that.

JJ

Rubbish.

Haz

So, aha, I played a new piece. New to me, it’s by Anna Clyne – C L Y N E if you'd like to look it up - and she's an amazing composer who wrote a piece - a work for cello in five parts - based on the poems of Rumi. And it's called Dance, and the movements are called different things. So it's like ‘Dance when you're broken open.’ ‘Dance like no one's watching.’ ‘Dance when you're bleeding.’ That, and I've chosen the final movement. ‘Dance as if you're free’ because it uses the bowed vibraphone.
 JJ
 Ah.
 Haz
 Yeah. And this is so cool. I kept on hearing… when we were playing,  we were all playing harmonics and I kept on hearing this, sort of like, really high pitch, almost like an aura of a sound above me, and I thought it was the harmonics until I actually lighthoused and looked around and saw what else was going on in the orchestra and I could see that the percussion section were using massive double bass bows on the vibraphone and I asked if that was a normal technique. They're like “Oh yeah, you just don't usually hear it.” It comes up occasionally and so I did this little deep dive. And found a piece that used this and I just wanted to bring it to the table to show you.

JJ

How exciting. 

Haz

I know. 
 JJ
 So can we, first of all, just hear perhaps that particular sound of a bowed vibraphone in isolation?
 Haz
 Yes. OK. So here is a bowed vibraphone and it's actually from a piece that’s called Morning Dove Sonnet by Christopher Dean.
 
 [Music: Christopher Dean: Morning Dove Sonnet]

JJ

I'm getting, sort of, a glass harmonium vibe there.

Haz

Yeah, very much like after Christmas dinner and everyone gets all the glasses out and it's like’ waaw’

JJ

It is a lovely glow of a sound, isn't it?

Haz

Yeah, it's beautiful. And I think the sound is… it comes over the orchestra, so it's a very textural sort of sound. So when the cello is playing really, really high and finishes off with a harmonic right on the bridge and everyone else is playing harmonics, it just it sits on top of that texture and just ‘bom’.

JJ

Just sings over the top.
 Haz
 Yeah.
 JJ
 So let's listen to that in context, then. This is Anna Clyne’s cello concerto.

Haz

Yeah,No. 5 and it's “When you're Perfectly Free.”

JJ

Brilliant.
 
 [Music: Anna Clyne: Cello Concerto, DANCE: V. when you’re perfectly free. Artists: Inbal Segev, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Marin Alsop]
 
 JJ
 Ringing true and clear.

Haz

Yeah. And I promise it's a little bit like ‘myyyy’, squinting a bit, like, I don't know, it's very shrill. But in the room, in a concert hall, it just fills… it's a warm sound. It's not a cold sound.

JJ

It goes through your body, but in a good way.

Haz

In a great way,
 JJ
 Like a spine tingle. 
 Haz
 Yeah. Not a sword. 
 JJ
 Great!
 Haz
 Yeah, exactly.

JJ

So, we started off with the mediaeval sounds of a recorder. Well, actually, Tabea was playing a baroque piece and we're going to end in the 1930s.
 Haz
 Oh.
 JJ
 With the theremin. 
 Haz
 Oh great.
 JJ
 Otherwise known as the etherphone back then.

Haz

Oh. Otherwise known as the lead instrument of the Midsommer Murders theme tune, do you know this?

JJ

No, I did not. 
 Haz
 ‘Woo ooh woo ooh ooh’ [to the tune of the Midsommer Murders theme tune]
 JJ
 It's been used so much for film music and for TV music because of its.. again it's that word, that haunting quality.

Haz

Yeah. 
 JJ
 Or, like, for daleks.
 Haz
 I was going to say it's an alien sound because if you've ever seen…Bill Bailey plays one right?

JJ

He does. 
 Haz
 you kind of have to see it to believe it.
 JJ
 You have to see the fact that there are two radio antennae and the artist is there just manipulating the pitch and the dynamics using shapes of their fingers and hands alone. Almost like playing an air instrument.
 Haz
 Yeah.
 JJ
 And… it must be terrifically hard to get that level of control so you end up with a well-intoned melody.

Haz

Yeah. You have to be a concert thereminist or theremin artist? I don't really know.

JJ

You have to dedicate a lot of hours, I would have thought.

Haz

Yeah, like minute precision, but also artistry.

JJ

It's a hooting sound as well as a haunting one. I have to say it reminds me of a soprano doing, you know, that kind of open-voiced hum

Haz

‘hnnng hnnng’. 
 Jon
 You know, when you go ‘nnnnng’, like that.
 Haz

Yeah.

JJ

And a, sort of, slightly, kind of, distant sound in its way, it feels as if it's coming from a different planet.

Haz

Yeah, totally.

JJ

And coming across… well, I mean, is, you know, produced by manipulating radio waves. So hardly surprising, but it manages to be deeply human as well. And you mentioned TV music. I can also say that Zappa and The Beach Boys and Portishead -
 Haz
 Oh!
 JJ
 a local band to where we're recording -
 Haz
 Amazing
 JJ
 have used it on their records as well.

Haz

That's really cool. It's just such a strange choice, I think as an add-on, isn't it? But it’s great!

JJ

Now talking of strange choices, can you name the following pop song that this theraminist is playing?
 
 [Music: The Long and Winding Road played on theramin]
 
 It is quite a comedy instrument, isn't it?

Haz

It's when you were fading it out, I was like ‘wwhhhhh” like going off… It’s beautiful.

JJ

Is it though?

Haz

No. Yes it is. But that - I do know what that was.

JJ

A strange beauty.

Haz

‘Long, long, winding road. Bom bah…’ 
 JJ
 By The Beatles.
 Haz
 By The Beatles.

JJ

Yes, well done, yes. Never heard before quite like that, I feel.

Haz

Please never again. No, no, no, it's great. Can I also do a plug for check out Charlie Draper, who's my mate’s brother who I found out is a theremin artist. And he honestly does loads on the theremin.

JJ

It's surprisingly popular. I think it's still… it’s one of those electronic instruments from the, sort of, the war period that has actually managed to stick, you know.

Haz

But why? And I love that it has. I'm so… I'm like, ”Great, this is brilliant.” But then I wouldn't listen to a whole concert of it.
 JJ
 No. 
 Haz
 But then I wouldn't of the viola.

JJ

It reminds me of the ondes martenot that Messiaen uses as a different instrument, but similar kind of hooting quality when required.

Haz

That's a backhanded compliment there JJ.

JJ

I'm doing my best. I'm doing my best. So, look, we started with the recorder, we've ended up with the theremin. And it's been a pleasure to have you with us, dear listeners.

Haz

It's been real.

JJ

It's been real as we go around our musical zoo, we've left out so many exotica, but I hope this is our way in for you.

Haz

Yeah, I mean, do check out more weird ones.

JJ

Yes. Now, talking about weird instruments, here's the one to see you out on. And I decided we could go for a mediaeval Welsh instrument.

Haz

Where else would we go?

JJ

Well quite. Now this is a cwrth. Have you ever heard of a cwrth?

Haz

No, no. Do you spell it C W R T H? 
 JJ
 You do indeed. Yeah.
 Haz
 Yeah. Sounds like a pigeon.

JJ

Well, it actually… I think its etymology has to do with a hump or being pregnant, you know that, kind of, sort of, rounded quality, which is confusing because when you look at it it's quite flat-bodied.
 Haz
 Right.
 JJ
 Actually. So maybe it's been flattened over time.
 Haz
 Yeah. 
 JJ
 It started life as a mediaeval lyre. That's as in L Y R E. 
 Haz
 Nice
 JJ
 With six strings that that you bow.

Haz

OK.

JJ

And I think it can be used both to accompany, but also as a solo instrument, because you have got all six strings there. And it also pops up in Welsh legends. For example, a Crythor du, so the black-haired cwrth player, ar blaiddiaid, which is and the wolves - goes to the wolves - ar blaiddiaid.

Haz

Ooh. That's so… I mean anything “and the wolves” is instantly… that's a bestseller in my mind. “JJ, and the Wolves.” Whoa!

JJ

I'm afraid my research isn't deep enough to tell you the story, but no matter. Let's just listen to the cwrth as we say a fond farewell.

Haz

Goodbye. See you soon.

JJ

See you soon. See you next month.

Haz

Enjoy the concert hwyl fawr.
 JJ
 Hwyl fawr.
 [Music: Dry A]