The Double Bass Kaleidoscope

[Joel Larsson]

Tomorrow I'm off to Germany to eventually visit the www.kontrabass-kaleidoskop.de course that will take place next week. Out in the middle of nowhere, for some reason; I can't bring my own double bass out into the frontier just like that, and now I realize i have forgotten to ask them about the possibilities of borrowing an instrument. Oh well. They have brought together a nice bunch of teachers this year anyway. Rabbath, Furtok, Tom Martin, teachers from Vienna and Mozarteum and whatnot. But most importantly, I might run into Anselm there! I'll say hi on behalf of all of you.

[Anselm Hauke]

sorry, i don´t find the time to go there
but please say hallo to Maria-Teresa Molina from me

[Richard Prowse]

Originally Posted by Anselm Hauke

sorry, i don´t find the time to go there
but please say hallo to Maria-Teresa Molina from me

Sorry E. Joel but I can't make it either. Say hello to Thomas Martin for me. He won't have a clue who I am but, hey, it's nice to be friendly.

There's a kid at school named Thomas Martin. I always ask him how the bass playing is going and he gives me a funny look.

[Joel Larsson]

Too bad you guys didn't show up. It was a great week, lots of nice teachers and players and a nice atmosphere. Made me realize I have to study in Germany or Austria someday. Hopefully already next season. We'll see. Found a new bow, a stunning piece of snakewood sculpted by F. Günter Hoyer. Five minutes after agreeing on the deal Stephan Petzold, teacher at the Hanns Eisler school in Berlin, offered me €3600 and ten lessons - a good thousand more than my price, the normal price of about €100 per hour for a lesson with a university professor not included - so it was probably a good buy. Now I only have to learn to play it...

All was fine until the trip home, when my Visa card didn't work in the ATMs, which kept telling me that I was out of money. I decided to take the risk of getting on a train, asked some German if this particular one that looked exactly as the one I had taken from the airport, and had the same desination, really went to the airport, which in the end it didn't, and I missed the flight. Some €650 in new tickets later - of course I didn't have a travel insurance, I'm a poor student! - (at which point it was at least made clear that I still had about as much money as I had hoped to and that those German money machines are to be trusted to about the same extent as the people's waypointing) I found myself having to stay for the night at the Oslo airport, which is only so much fun. My life was made a lot easier by a very kind hostess, who gave me all the food I could eat, and a very nice fellow bass player with a great moustache who happened to be in the seat next to me, who made sure I got both his and his wife's sandwiches. There is hope for humanity.

And, it was really a very nice course.

[Richard Prowse]

Originally Posted by Joel Larsson

All was fine until the trip home, when my Visa card didn't work in the ATMs, which kept telling me that I was out of money. I still had about as much money as I had hoped to and that those German money machines are to be trusted to about the same extent as the people's waypointing.

Talk to Anselm. He should be able to get something done about those German money machines.