Think of classical cello and your mind may meander off the direction of, say Pablo Casals or Jacqueline de Pre, producing magical readings of Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G major or Elgar’s Cello Concerto.
While Talia Erdal may not quite be up there in the same rarified stratospheric regions of the cello-playing pantheon, she is the principal cellist of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO). So she surely knows which way up to hold the four-string instrument and how to maneuver her bow if, perchance, she happens to be contributing to a rendition of a symphony by Mendelssohn, Dvorak, or Beethoven.
That much has been abundantly clear for some years now as the talented Jerusalem-based musician made great strides in the classical world, starting her undergraduate degree studies at the tender age of 15 and crafting a sure course to a quality and enduring career in the field.
That is still very much the case but, for a couple or so years now, Erdal has also been applying her gifts in very different areas of sonic expression. For starters, it seems she can sing, and pretty well too. And what she has been putting her cello through, in house concerts and other intimate settings is some way beyond the artistic and technical purview of the mainstream classical milieu.
She will demonstrate where her extracurricular “moonlighting” activities are taking her on December 14, when she plays a solo concert at Mishkenot Sha’ananim in her hometown (doors open 8 p.m., show starts 8:30 p.m.). Judging by the videos I’ve seen of her doing her thing in soiree settings, and even on stage with the UK-based Trinity Laban Symphony Orchestra, some of the skills she employs with the JSO will be in evidence. But there will be much more in the executional mix.
Breaking new creative bounds in music
Erdal seems to have no physical or creative bounds when it comes to putting her stuff out there. Thus far, her quest to break new ground has taken her into numerous disciplinary and stylistic fields, including early music, classical cello repertoire, contemporary music, folk, jazz, rock, world, and free improvisation. In her pre-JSO days, she worked with the Tel Aviv Soloists Ensemble, and she has done rewarding time with German jazz outfit Der Weise Panda as well as with the aforementioned British ensemble, comprising students of the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London, which Erdal attended during a year she took out from her JSO tenure.
The cellist traces much of what she does today, outside her daytime job, to that furlough in the UK.
“I think that comes from the influences I took on while I was in London,” she muses when I ask here whence she draws the heavy bluesy spirit that informs, for example, her signature number “Moonlight.” It is a smoky raunchy song that has the artist producing a thrust-and-parry kickass pizzicato delivery augmented by seductive glissandos punctuated by needle-sharp percussive taps on the body of the cello. And the vocals owe a lot more to the Deep South of the US than the leafy Old Katamon environs of Erdal’s own home patch.
She didn’t quite get that from the source but fed off folks who were closer to it than she was at the time.
“While I was in London I went to blues and jazz clubs,” she recalls. “Also, at the time, I had a partner who was into Motown (soul music). It was during the first lockdown and she had a record player at home with loads of Motown records. I heard a lot of that during the first lockdown, so I think that also has impacted on me. And I actually wrote ‘Moonlight’ during the lockdown.”
Erdal clearly has plenty to offer in the way of personality and stage presence. She not only works her way in and out of the cello, utilizing extraneous implements such as a drumstick to rattle out rapid staccato melodies, and her own body as a percussive substratum for the song in question. Her stage banter comes across as fluid and entertaining. Hence it comes as some surprise to hear it took Erdal a while to get out of first gear.
And she hadn’t exactly just been sitting in the shadows just doing her thing on cello. She wrote, and recorded, charts with Der Weise Panda and has been setting pen to paper for some time now. So what kept her?
“I don’t know. I didn’t really take it seriously and I didn’t have the courage to do a whole show with my own music. I’d do, for example, a program of classical works and then I’d add a song. Eventually, I began doing concerts that were split equally between, say baroque sonatas and the other half would be my own songs.” In those days the self-penned numbers were more localcentric. “I wrote songs in Hebrew and in a Mediterranean style and Israeli songs.”
In fact, however, everything was already in place just waiting for Erdal to flip the switch.
“Suddenly, I thought, I’ve got lots of material and, in principle, I’ve got enough to put on an evening of my music. But I still needed to find the guts to say my music is good enough to put out there.”
“Moonlight” and other songs she performs on her ownsome these days, like “Prelude Improvisation No. 1,” “Falling,” “Ballada Lemotta Shel Yona (A Ballad for the Death of Yona) are incontrovertible evidence that the time was ripe for Erdal to strut her own stuff.
The house concert run began with a little help from a friend of the cellist’s partner, Ella Stahl, who attended a show Erdal put on at the Mifletzet pub in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Hayovel.
“It was only the first or second week of the war and the place was packed out,” says Erdal. “It was part of Barutina [cultural events in Jerusalem].”
It was something of an epiphany for Erdal.
“I was amazed so many people came to the show. I didn’t really know how it would work out. It was a very personal show. How many people would want to hear a song about my mother [who was called Yona] who died seven years earlier?” The latter refers to “Ballada Lemotta Shel Yona.” It transpired that the answer to that one was lots. “While I was performing I realized that people needed that. They needed to sit together, drink beer, and just be together around something that wasn’t about the war. People cried and were moved by the whole thing.”
So was Stahl and she convinced Erdal to do a bunch of house shows Stahl arranged for her in double quick time. The cellist-vocalist was soon doing a couple of cozy gigs a week and was getting ready to move her solo spot to more formal surroundings.
“I am hoping to video and record the [Mishkenot Shaananim] show so the music can be documented,” Erdal explains. “People often came up to me after a show and ask where they can hear and see the music, so I thought it’s about time I got it down properly.”
There are other cellists around the world who combine multifarious instrumental and vocal delivery. Abel Selaocoe from South Africa deploys his mellifluous singing and cello playing across a broad range of genres and styles, while irrepressibly comedic American cellist Rushad Egglestone plies a very different entertainment niche. And there’s our very own Maya Belsitzman who has been at the forefront of the singing cellist scene here for some time. But Erdal has her own unique treasures to offer and does so in a most impressive, joy-inducing, and endearing manner.
Erdal feels her decision to strike out on her own has provided rewards all round.
“I didn’t really expect there to be such a need for music now, especially now,” she says. “But in some strange way this time has restored my faith in music. I see what it does for people in the most fundamental way. It is a basic human need. It is not a luxury. It is not just nice entertainment. We all need this.”
One wonders if the folks over at the Culture Ministry are of the same opinion. Either way, Erdal is ready to do her own thing to keep our spirits on an even keel, on December 14 and beyond.
