Arvo Pärt – Fratres for Cello and Piano

June 24, 2012

This song is rated: 2 Pills – intermediate musicologist level

cheerlubber again!

Posting three days in a row! Sick of me yet? I want to get back on track with our Sunday Classical posts again, even though I’m probably the only one who cares about it. Today I feature Arvo Pärt with his piece titled Fratres for Cello and Piano. This will be the first classical song I mark as a two pill! :0  Yes, even some instrumental music can be for certain ears only. I did this because Fratres is a more modern composition; from about the turn of the century on, composers became more and more experimental and these works also became more accepted, because of course each new generation tries to do something different from the last. Arvo Pärt is actually an Estonian composer. Now I know Estonia Week is officially over, but I found this when I was looking for a classical post last week and liked it so much that I knew I wanted to share it. I listened to some of Arvo Pärt’s other works and I’ll be honest, they didn’t tickle my fancy all too much. He is known for being a minimalist composer, and while some of his works had their little magical moments, most of them didn’t really hold my attention all too well. Fratres is a lot of variation on the same few notes, but I think it’s very melancholy and beautiful. I like the exchanges between the piano and the cello, and when the cello plays the high notes (known as “harmonics”), I think it creates a very ethereal, otherworldly feel. In fact–bet you didn’t know–the cello has the largest range out of all string instruments. It can hit low notes and sound like a bass or it can hit high notes and sound like a violin. Whuzzerface says: “The cello is like the all-star of string instruments, and I’m not just saying that because I used to be a cellist.” Oh reeeally…

You know what this song reminds me of? The music in The Village (composed by James Newton Howard). It’s got the frantic feel at the beginning, then soothes out, glides along, and hits those high harmonics. This is also the longest song I’ve posted thus far, but don’t let the 10 minutes in length scare you. Press play and let it go in the background as you do your thing. I think you’ll find it’ll give a great atmosphere to whatever you’re doing. Enjoy below!