The cello ( CHEL-oh; plural celli or cellos) or violoncello ( VY-ə-lən-CHEL-oh; Italian pronunciation: [vjolonˈtʃɛllo]) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G2, D3 and A3. The viola's four strings are each an octave higher. Music for the cello is generally written in the bass clef, with tenor clef and treble clef used for higher-range passages.
The six Cello Suites, BWV 1007–1012, are suites for unaccompanied cello by Johann Sebastian Bach. They are some of the most frequently performed solo compositions ever written for cello. Bach most likely composed them during the period 1717–23, when he served as Kapellmeister in Köthen. The title given on the cover of the Anna Magdalena Bach manuscript was Suites à Violoncello Solo senza Basso.
Pieter Wispelwey is a Dutch cellist. In 1992, he was the first cellist to receive the Netherlands Music Prize, a government-awarded prize given to the most promising young musician in the Netherlands. He has come to be regarded as one of the world's leading performers and interpreters of both baroque and modern cello works.
Truls Olaf Otterbech Mørk is a Norwegian cellist.
Yosif Feigelson is a concert cellist living in the United States.
David Geringas is a Lithuanian cellist and conductor who studied under Mstislav Rostropovich. In 1970 he won the gold medal at the International Tchaikovsky Competition. He also plays the baryton, a rare instrument associated with music of Joseph Haydn.
The sonatas and partitas for solo violin are a set of six works composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. They are sometimes referred to in English as the sonatas and partias for solo violin in accordance with Bach's headings in the autograph manuscript: "Partia" was commonly used in German-speaking regions during Bach's time, whereas the Italian "partita" was introduced to this set in the 1879 Bach Gesellschaft edition, having become standard by that time. The set consists of three sonatas da chiesa in four movements and three partitas in dance-form movements. The 2nd Partita is widely known for its Chaconne, considered one of the most masterly and expressive works ever written for solo violin.
Giovanni Battista Cirri was an Italian cellist and composer in the 18th century.
Mats Lidström is a Swedish solo cellist, recording artist, chamber musician, composer, teacher and publisher.
Perpetual Motion is an album of classical music released in 2001. The album is unusual in that none of the pieces featured on it are played on the instruments for which they were written. Arrangers Béla Fleck and Edgar Meyer won a Grammy in 2002 for their arrangement of Claude Debussy's "Doctor Gradus Ad Parnassum". The album also won a Grammy as Best Classical Crossover Album.
Laszlo Varga was a Hungarian-born American cellist who had a worldwide status as a soloist, recording artist, and authoritative cello teacher.
Ennio Bolognini was an Argentine-born American cellist, guitarist, composer, conductor, professional boxer, pilot, and flight instructor. Though seldom remembered today, his musical virtuosity was widely admired by his contemporaries during his lifetime. Pablo Casals praised him as "the greatest cello talent I ever heard in my life". Gregor Piatigorsky told Christine Walevska's father, "No, I am not the greatest cellist in the world; neither is Feuermann. The greatest is the Argentine Bolognini."
Johann Sebastian Bach composed suites, partitas and overtures in the baroque dance suite format for solo instruments such as harpsichord, lute, violin, cello and flute, and for orchestra.
The keyboard concertos, BWV 1052–1065, are concertos for harpsichord, strings and continuo by Johann Sebastian Bach. There are seven complete concertos for a single harpsichord, three concertos for two harpsichords, two concertos for three harpsichords, and one concerto for four harpsichords. Two other concertos include solo harpsichord parts: the concerto BWV 1044, which has solo parts for harpsichord, violin and flute, and Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D major, with the same scoring. In addition, there is a nine-bar concerto fragment for harpsichord which adds an oboe to the strings and continuo.
"Ave Maria" is a popular and much-recorded setting of the Latin prayer Ave Maria, originally published in 1853 as "Méditation sur le Premier Prélude de Piano de J.S. Bach". The piece consists of a melody by the French Romantic composer Charles Gounod that he superimposed over an only very slightly changed version of Bach's Prelude No. 1 in C major, BWV 846, from Book I of his The Well-Tempered Clavier, published in 1722. It was published with a French text in 1853, but it was the 1859 version with the Latin Ave Maria which became popular.
Olli Mustonen is a Finnish pianist, conductor, and composer.
Tanya Anisimova is a Russian cellist and composer.
This is the discography for Tanya Anisimova.
Alan Shulman was an American composer and cellist. He wrote a considerable amount of symphonic music, chamber music, and jazz music. Trumpeter Eddie Bailey said, "Alan had the greatest ear of any musician I ever came across. He had better than perfect pitch. I've simply never met anyone like him." Some of his more well known works include his 1940 Neo-Classical Theme and Variations for Viola and Piano and his A Laurentian Overture, which was premiered by the New York Philharmonic in 1952 under the baton of Guido Cantelli. Also of note is his 1948 Concerto for Cello and Orchestra which was also premiered by the New York Philharmonic with cellist Leonard Rose and conductor Dmitri Mitropoulos. Many of Shulman's works have been recorded, and the violinist Jascha Heifetz and jazz clarinetist Artie Shaw have been particular exponents of his work both in performance and on recordings.
Philip Lasser is an American composer, pianist, and music theorist. He is a member of the faculty at the Juilliard School in New York City.
