Cellist to solo in Chatter concerts in Santa Fe and Albuquerque
Principal cellist with the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra Joseph Johnson will bring the sounds of Bach and Britten to Chatter in both Santa Fe and Albuquerque on Saturday, July 13 and Sunday, July 14.
Coming to Santa Fe feels like a working vacation, the principal cellist with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra said. The season marks his 10th playing the summer music festival.
“I would live here yearround,” Johnson said, fresh off dress rehearsals for “La Bohème.” “The older I get, the less I like big cities.”
Johnson will play two cello suites: Benjamin Britten’s Suite No. 1 for Unaccompanied Cello, Op. 72, dedicated to the great Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. The second is J.S. Bach’s Cello Suite No. 4 in E-flat major.
“Bach and Britten are the two greatest composers for solo cello,” the cellist said. “It’s
hard to write for cello without anything else.
“With Bach, you hate to use the word ‘perfection,’ but it’s pretty close,” he continued. “You can play it one day, one way and you can play it another way another day and it still works.”
Johnson waited until his 30s to perform solo Bach in public.
“It’s so personal and you feel naked on stage,” he explained.
The cellist fell in love with Britten after working with a teacher who had studied in the composer in Great Britain.
“It was very overwhelming as a student,” Johnson said. “It’s very, very hard technically, but it’s also extremely physical emotionally.”
The suite is comprised of nine continuous movements.
“It’s very bombastic,” Johnson said. “Anytime I play Britten in public, people go nuts. It isn’t something you expect from a cello.”
The cellist grew up in Chicago, where he played the piano and cello in the public schools. He started with the violin in third grade, which was a disaster.
“I hurt my chin,” he said. “It just ripped it up.”
So he switched to the cello, despite the awkwardness of lifting such a large instrument.
“It’s bigger than you are; carrying it around is really hard,” he acknowledged. “But it kind of stuck.You can play it in a symphony orchestra; you can play it in a chamber orchestra; you can play it solo. It’s a very social instrument.”