Can this really be the sixth year? Groundhog Day approaches fast, and that means it’s time for Keys Please!

Carei Thomas, Todd Harper and I have been running this annual tradition of a playful, genre-bending celebration of keyboard music since 2001, and by golly, I think we’ve got something special going. It shows a slightly different side of my musical life than In the Hands, and it’s unlike any other concert I know of. For those of you who don’t know about Keys Please, Minnesota Public Radio did a wonderful feature on last year’s concert.

This year’s special guest is David Edminster, who is mostly a tenor sax player, but will also be slipping in some bassoon and clarinet. The guy has got some serious jazz in him; you don’t want to miss this.

Keys Please 6: The Reckoning
Friday, February 2 - 8:00 PM
Janet Wallace Concert Hall
Macalester College, St. Paul, MN
$10 at the door / all students free

Two weeks from today. Reckon I’ll see you there? Hope so!

Update: Here’s a flyer you can stick on your fridge, or wear as a hat. Print it out, cut it in half, and give one to a friend! Thanks to Walter Velez for the very cool font.

In the Hands will come back to life soon. I’m getting settled into my new job (which is a good thing: nice people, interesting problems), and I’ve sorted out the “sudden car death” crisis that’s been eating up lots of time lately.

In the meantime, if you’d like a sneak preview of the two Chopin nocturnes I’m planning to record, come to my concert this weekend:

Keys Please: The Untold Story
Saturday, February 4 - 8:00 PM
Janet Wallace Concert Hall
Macalester College, St. Paul, MN
$10 at the door / all students free

It will be a grand time!

And, to whet your appetite: MPR’s excellent Marianne Combs did a wonderful interview with us about Keys Please. You can read the text of story on the site, but I strongly recommend listening to the web audio if you can — the sounds add a great deal.

The interview sounds so natural as I listen, it’s easy to forget how rare this is: an interview that the interviewee likes, that captures what is important and hones right in on the essence of the subject. That’s hard enough in world news, harder still where art is concerned. (True, she pronounces my last name wrong, but she did such a great job capturing the spirit of Keys Please that I’ll forgive her ten times over.) We musicians should always be so lucky. Thanks a million, Marianne!

Last night’s concert was a delight to play in — and the audience tells us they had a good time as well. My third ballade was a bit fudgy, but got enthusiastic comments nonetheless. And people surpised me by also really liking the Dance for Remembering and Forgetting and especially the Entropic Waltz. It seems that the sensual surface of the first and the humor and recklessness of the second won out over the strangeness of the music. Say what you will about the Lone Artist maintaining the Integrity of their Vision in the face of an Unforgiving Society — it’s always gratifying when people actually like what I do!

I was actually feeling kind of discouraged about the completely lackluster, conversation-stopping, everyone-stares-at-their-shoes-and-shuffles-uncomfortably response to my request for suggestions on keeping In the Hands going. (Three days after that post, I have one donation and zero reader comments.) A successful performance was a tonic for my spirits. A second tonic came last night from Leslie Ball, who asked me to play accordion at Balls Cabaret on the spur of the moment. I said with minor distress that I didn’t know what I would play, and she said, “Oh, Paul, everything you do is beautiful!” Well…shucks. I don’t think that’s actually true, but it’s just about the nicest thing you could say to a performer. (I’ll provide a future aside at some point about how the word “beautiful” to me encompasses a far greater range of experiences than “pretty.”) What a good soul she is!

All of this was made ten times sweeter by the fact that my parents were here to visit from Colorado for the weekend. They are the very best of all for putting me in good spirits, for reminding me just what it is I generally mean to do by living! Oh, I’d best pull myself in, lest I have to start a third blog dedicated entirely to gushing about them! But I’m sure all the people who spent time with them this weekend would agree: there would be plenty of material for that.

Sorry for the lack of a recording this weekend. I’ll be back on the bus next Tuesday.

Todd Harper, Carei Thomas and I will be having our annual celebration of music, friendship, and
keyboards on Saturday, Feb 5. Our special guest this year is Laurie Witzkowsi, singer, drummer
and composer.

Song of Keys Please
8:00 PM Saturday, February 5
Macalester College Concert Hall
St. Paul, Minnesota
$10 admission (all students free)

Rehearsals have been going well, and this stands to be a rollicking good time, as the past three were! Carei has a little bit of inspired madness called Synescalatoria that is bending my poor brain into weird knots. I mean that in a good way. I’ll be doing a new piece and the third Chopin Ballade. And yes, I will be playing the accordion again (just a very little, as I still don’t really know how to play the darn thing). Do come if you can.

The experiment: Greg Schaffner posted an interesting comment in which he suggested using improvisations as segues between pieces. I thought that sounded fun, so at two concerts yesterday, I put improvs — completely spontaneous, no planning — between all the pieces within each set. And, to make it all as spontaneous as possible, I had the audience draw the names of pieces to determine the order.

The results: We had a good time. None of the improvs were really outstanding, but they worked well enough, and the audience got into the spirit of the thing. I don’t think I’ll repeat this experiment (I have fun planning the program order, and don’t want to give that up!), but I will work some improvs into future Zos.

In college, I won an award from the Math/CS department for being the most outstanding procrastinator of my senior class. I don’t think it’s exactly fair to say that I procrastinate, though; I’m just perpetually late. My life is like a finely tuned Swiss watch that’s set to the wrong time.

So I finally got around to putting The Monster from Keys Please! up on the site. To celebrate the occasion, here’s the opening number in its original, bare, single-piano form:

Paul Cantrell
The Monster’s Theme

Download (1:06 / 1.3 M)

Compare that with the full-on decked-out two-pianos-with-Todd-belting-it-out-in-his-monster-voice version from the concert!

I should mention that, if you’re one of these retro folks who likes physical media with high-quality sound and high-resolution artwork, you can buy the CD of the concert. This will also be of interest to those of you who like to support independent artists!

And, in keeping with the “always behind but never idle” theme of this post, I’ve revamped my music home page as I’ve been meaning to do for the last six months. New! Improved! Bright, not just white!

Tonight was a pleasantly social concert. My fellow composer Matthew (from the Composers’ Syndicate) brought his whole family over, making this the first Zo Family Night ever. His kids, who are great in general, were a great audience, and drew some awesome pictures while I was playing. And I had the pleasure of introducing Matthew’s wife Lauren, who illustrates picture books, to the wonder that is the Church Mouse books.

Denise, a fine singer I know from buying sheet music at The Podium, also came and was an honorary part of the family. Alas, The Podium is not going to sell sheet music anymore, focusing only on guitars. I will thus not make such acquaintances there in the future since the only guitar I play is the 200-some-string variety. As far as I know, this leaves us without a good classical sheet music store in the Twin Cities. The silver lining is that all their classical sheet music is now 75% off, so a I highly recommend that all you locals dash over there and clean them out.

The music, you say? Oh yes, there was some of that, too. You know, I think I’m actually on the verge of playing that Chopin ballade well.

• Cantrell – Three Places
• Brahms – Intermezzo Op 117 No 2
• Brahms – Intermezzo Op 117 No 1
• Chopin – Ballade No 3
• Cantrell – Cradle Waltz
• Chopin – Nocturne Op 15 No 2
• Chopin – Nocturne Op 15 No 3
• Brahms – Ballade Op 10 No 4

I thought it was only going to be a crowd of five tonight, but Dave J. brought two friends at the last minute. It’s gratifying to have a full house!

People were in a chatty mood (or maybe I was, and it rubbed off), which lead to a few questions about the music. I wonder how I can encourage people to ask more? I enjoy explaining things (although I’m not always good at it) and showing off my favorite spots in the music, but it’s hard to get the ball rolling. When everybody’s been very quiet and listening intently for so long, they’re not always quick to speak up and throw questions out. Somehow tonight was a great audience for it. I’ll work more at tomorrow’s concert to encourage questions from people and see what happens.

• Cantrell – Cradle Waltz
• Chopin – Nocturne Op 15 No 2
• Chopin – Nocturne Op 15 No 3
• Brahms – Ballade Op 10 No 4
• Cantrell – Three Places
• Brahms – Intermezzo Op 117 No 2
• Brahms – Intermezzo Op 117 No 1
• Chopin – Ballade No 3

This same program I’ve been tinkering with continues to please me, so I think I’ll keep the same basic idea going through tomorrow’s concert. Then I want to take a little hiatus from these — probably until well into November — so I can immerse myself in composing this set of dances I’ve been working on. I now have a pretty clear picture of the whole thing, and find myself full of ideas and energy for bringing it about!

Update [Oct 8]: Oops! I listed the program wrong; it’s corrected now.