Rabbath @ North Texas This Weekend!

[Ben Rose]

Francois Rabbath will be giving a masterclass and recital this Sunday (March 6th) at UNT.


From the ISB Website:

Special bass events this semester at the University of North Texas: March 6, 4 pm, recital by Francois Rabbath, Recital Hall, University of North Texas. Francois will be giving masterclasses on March 6, noon, Rm. 232, and March 7 at 7:30 pm in Rm. 232;

[masmasbasso]

Rabbath was at the University of Texas here in Austin this past week. I was really blown away by the recital. I didn't get to go to the master classes, but I was right in front of him for the recital.
This is what he played:
Poucha-dass (with Tabla) by François Rabbath
Reitba (with piano) by François Rabbath
Equation (Solo Bass) by François Rabbath
Adagio in F by Antonio Vivaldi
Chasse à Cours (Solo Bass) by François Rabbath
Le Cri (With Piano) by François Rabbath
Nine Variants on Paganini (with Piano) by Frank Proto
Le Mi Dans Le Mille (With Piano) by François Rabbath

I thought Reitba was beautiful. I would like to learn it. I also dug La Cri.
He was doing some crazy harmonic over-tone/buzz saw type of sounds on the first piece which was the raga with the tabla. I thought I could figure it out when I got home that night, but I'm still trying to pull it off.

I love his style. Refined but he has the spirit of a folk street performer. It was my first time seeing him, so I was focusing on his left hand technique.

[Ben Rose]

I also dug Le Cri..what a moving piece. He played the same repetoire except for Le Mi Dans Le Mille. However, at the end he and Lynn Seaton played a few duets. (Autumn Leaves and Satin Doll).

This was my first time seeing him as well, but I ended up focusing more on his bow technique.

I love his style. Refined but he has the spirit of a folk street performer.

I agree.

[masmasbasso]

Originally Posted by PhoBucket

However, at the end he and Lynn Seaton played a few duets. (Autumn Leaves and Satin Doll).

Oh, I would have loved to see that. I was checking out his left hand because I've never seen any of his books and I was curious see how the extended (lower on neck) thumb position worked.

He seems like a great guy. Did you get to go to any of the Master Classes at UNT? I heard he did one on Bach, but I'm not sure what the other class was about. I'm not a student at UT and I didn't want to try to crash the party, so I just saw the recital.

I wish Lyn was there when I was at UNT. It was just Fred Hamilton teaching guitar and bass and Ed Rainbow plus grad students. The only jazz bass class was taught on electric bass. Fred put up with me taking my double bass to class. Eventually it caught on and a couple of other guys did the same thing. I was also the only guy playing gut strings so I was kind of a freak back then. (late 80's early 90's, Mike Pope, Nathan Berg, Mike Garret and John Button were some of the top jazz guys then)


EDIT:
Did he do the Raga with Sitar or Tabla. He does it with either, but said he likes the tabla better?

[Ben Rose]

I'm not a UNT student, although I want to go there for grad school in the near future. I only attended the recital.

Do you know Rich Glass? I believe he was at UNT at around that time.

[masmasbasso]

Oh yeah, Rich ran around in the same group of people that I did. He might not remember me by name at first, but he would if he saw me (maybe not I had long hair back then and looked like Chris Cornell from Soundgarden). Mention my name (John Thomasson) if you see him. We spent time at parties with mutual friends like Jesse Hall, Eric Korb and Dave Palmer.