Watching a Video About a Cello, as a Cellist

Christina Jones 

April 07, 2020

Field Notes on the Berliner Philharmoniker’s “Rachel Helleur-Simcock: a Portrait” Film

1. The film opens by panning around the different faces of members of the Berliner Philharmoniker and all I can think is, “Wow, that’s a lot of white.” It’s a sea of white faces, really. 

   1. I find myself feeling quite intimated already, and we have not even gotten through the opening credits! Yikes. → the more I think about this, the further down a kind of dark hole of thinking about how a Black person like myself would likely never even be a consideration for a spot in the Berliner Philharmoniker. :(

2. We first see Rachel Helleur-Simcock walking into and then playing in her flat. She plays an absolutely beautiful, sweet rendition of Bach Cello Suite I: Allemande. I shake my head slightly because I’m thinking something along the lines of, “Wow. How does one even sound that in tune and that lovely while playing solo Bach?!” → let me say that the Bach Cello Suites, next to the technically unforgiving forty Popper Etudes, are in my opinion the most exposed repertoire that any cellist can study. The Bach Cello Suites are pieces of music which, as my teachers have often told me, one can and ought to work on every single day, throughout one’s life, for the journey of finding nuances and carving out the exact sound that one wants is a journey along which one can follow for a lifetime. 

   1. I find myself wondering if Rachel Helleur-Simcock is perfectly content with how she plays this Allemande here. More than likely, not quite. What is she listening to in hearing this recording, and hearing as cringe-worthy or something that she would like to “make better”? Does she feel awkward and uncomfortable when she watches videos such as this one of herself playing? She looks so relaxed… 

3. Wow! She started on the violin first and then switched to cello!! 

4. “Whenever I saw an orchestra, that was already -- looked like home to me.” -Rachel Helleur-Simcock. 

   1. → !!*Wow! Interesting to hear someone say that they wanted from the start to be an orchestral musician. From my own experiences with classical musicians of all sorts, I have tended to assume that orchestral playing is what people are attracted to because of its security and its benefits, being part of an organization instead of being a free-lancer and self-promoter. It’s the steadiest work out there for a classical performer. Yet, here is one of the world’s most skilled orchestral cellists saying that she has seen the orchestra as her “home” always!

      1. Admittedly, this kind of encourages me to view orchestral playing with a newfound respect and admiration. I suppose I am fairly jaded and disillusioned when it comes to orchestral playing because I have done so much of it, and often not by choice. It is mandatory in all conservatory curricula. 

5. Rachel Helleur-Simcock on her current cello: “It’s not too clear… it has some texture… it’s got kind of a golden honey singing voice.” 

   1. The luthier commenting on the instrument: “It was probably made in Turin in the 1730s.” 

6. I am very distracted while the luthier talks about the instrument because I am listening to the sound of Rachel Helleur-Simcock playing Prokofiev Cello Sonata in C Major: I., a piece with which I am well-acquainted and have played myself. 

   1. I find that when I play pieces that I have played myself, I am more distracted by them than by pieces that I have not personally played, because I want to hear exactly what this player does with the piece. What nuances will they include that I have not thought of or have not yet been able to achieve technically? How is their intonation? What kinds of bow articulations are they implementing? 

7. “My relationship to my cello is like a marriage. It may not be perfect, but we’re gonna stick it out forever.” -Rachel Helleur-Simcock. 

   1. I hear this and instantly have heart eyes because this is so cute!!! I love cello love. And she is clearly head-over-heels in love with her cello. I also love the idea that clelo love is like a marriage: it takes TONS of work and patience, it’s the one of the very deepest loves one will ever experience in one’s life, and it’s permanent. The love of music stays with you eternally. 

8. !~~ My takeaway thought from watching this film: !!*** It really is a unique opportunity to be able to get an intimate look at this valuable and deeply personally-significant instrument from the Berliner Philharmoniker, hear conversations between its current player and an expert luthier regarding the instrument, and hear it be played, in the home of the current player, no less. These are private musical moments to which I am being granted access by this film, and I feel very grateful for that.