World on a string
Sheku Kanneh-Mason brings star power to role as cello’s ambassador
“Same Boat” could be a Sam Smith song. Or a Sam Cooke song. The bones of “Same Boat” are soul and pop — tender, sweet and sublime soul and pop. It’s a cracking good tune but what elevates it to great is the instrumentation, the cello singing a bright counter melody pucntuated by pizzicato runs.
The song comes at the end of English cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason’s 2022 album “Song.” The LP features compositions by Bach, Beethoven and Stravinsky. But “Same Boat,” Kanneh-Mason’s collaboration with British pop star Zak Abel, feels at home on “Song.”
“I got to know Zak after some events together, we became very good friends, and we’d often jam together,” Kanneh-Mason told the Herald from the other side of the Atlantic. “We decided to write a song together and it was my first time writing a song in that style but I really enjoyed the process.”
If Kanneh-Mason wrote “Same Boat” the first time out, he might want to consider scrapping the cello and writing pop full time. Well, he might want to consider that if he didn’t have so much on his calendar already. Kanneh-Mason will spend 2023 crisscrossing the planet to play with the world’s best ensembles — he makes his
Boston Symphony Orchestra debut on Feb. 9 with Ernest Bloch’s 1916 “Schelomo.”
Just into his 20s, Kanneh-Mason is a major star. In 2016, he won the BBC Young Musician competition. In
2018, he played to two billion people when he performed at the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex at Windsor Castle. Last year, at the age of 22, he was named a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. Despite all this, he barely stands out in his family — his six siblings are also classically trained musicians who he often plays with including sister Isata Kanneh-Mason and brother Braimah Kanneh-Mason, fellow former scholarship students at The Royal Academy of Music.
“All of us play the piano and stringed instrument, so it was nice, I grew up surrounded by other people playing and practicing, talking about music and listening to music,” he said. “For me the whole environment was perfect… We had to create a rotation (to use the pianos). But I didn’t practice the piano much after the age of 13 or 14, I would just play a little bit each day. We had three pianos growing up. But with the cello, I could practice anywhere, mostly in my bedroom.”
Although sometimes on the toilet (lid down!) when he needed the space.
These days he doesn’t take his instrument into the bathroom, which is a good idea considering it’s 300 years old.
“It was made in 1700, it’s very, very special,” he said. “It’s not a rule that the old instruments are better. It’s that my cello was incredibly well made. Although there is something to the fact that my cello has been vibrating and resonating for so many years.”
Kanneh-Mason’s success has made him a global ambassador for the cello and part of his mission is to expand the repertoire of the instrument.
“People will come to concerts because of repertoire they know, and now I feel in some places I’m in a position to present music that’s less well known,” he said. “If it’s great music and I feel a connection to it, I will always want to play it and present it.”
And Kanneh-Mason has a wide opinion of what great music is. He loves a lot of reggae, folk music and hip hop. That love has served him well. Just go listen to “Same Boat.”
For tickets and more information, visit bso.org.