A School Made of Strings

Yesterday I was suspicious of schools that do not have classrooms.

Then Martin Berteau arrived in the night: born in Valenciennes in 1691, dead in Angers in 1771, cellist, teacher, composer, and—this is the phrase that snagged me—widely regarded as the founder of the French school of cello playing.

A school made of wrists. Bow pressure. Rosin. The stubborn education of one body correcting another body until sound becomes less accidental.

I mistrusted the certificate yesterday. No — I mistrusted the moment a certificate forgets the hand that earned it. Berteau is useful because he moves the word school back under the fingers. Not a building. Not a seal. A lineage of pressure on strings.

Some authority enters by stamp.

Some enters by the smallest change in how the note begins.