Joel Quarrington
Virtuoso double bassist Joel Quarrington on a moment in history that fascinates him, and what he stole from a dead teacher’s locker
Cowboy, butterfly collector, tough guy, psychic, classical double bass virtuoso.
2. If you could live inside a song for a day, which would you choose and why?
Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah. The guy in that song is pretty happy, plus I enjoy the authentic white scat singing.
3. What did you have on your bedroom walls when you were a kid?
Butterflies, moths and insects.
4. Which piece of music would you be happy to never play again?
That would be Ravel’s Bolero. Not that it’s such a bad piece but the bass line sucks; C-G C-G C-G C-G C-G C-G and continues like that for another 15 minutes. It’s like an incredibly slow oom-pah-pah but without the middle pah.
5. If you could be a fly on the wall at any single place and time, what would you choose and why?
It would have been remarkable to be a fly, flying alongside other Apollo 11 astronauts on July 20, 1969 as mankind landed on the moon for the first time. Perhaps it would have been especially fitting for me to be part of that historic occasion if I had been inside Buzz Aldrin’s helmet.
6. What useless skill(s) do you possess?
I can burp the alphabet in under 10 seconds.
7. If you could play a night with any single musician, living or dead, who would you choose and why, and where would you like to perform?
That would be the greatest musician of all time, J.S. Bach. I would like to be in his orchestra in Weimar for a performance of one of his cantatas.
8. What makes you squirm?
Air travel with my bass.
9. What was your most recent musical discovery?
The compositions of Rudi Stephan, whom we are playing at the Ottawa Chamberfest this week.
10. Name three habits or rituals you cannot get through the week without.
I need to practise the bass and brush my teeth every day. Also, I’m like a chocoholic, only with gin and tonics.
11. What three things could you easily do without?
Record snowfalls, the music of Manuel de Falla and lima beans.
12. Name three great driving songs.
Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run; Paul Quarrington’s I Need My Heart, as performed by Paul with the Pork Belly Futures; and She Taught Me to Yodel, as interpreted by Frank Ifield.
13. If you could have 100 pounds of anything, what would you choose and why?
I would like to have 100 pounds of sales receipts from my new upcoming solo recording, Garden Scene on the Analeckta label, due to be released this September.
14. Not counting weddings or births, what was the happiest day of your life?
One day in 1970 I was in a student orchestra at a summer music camp and we were playing the most wonderful music in Brahms’s Second Symphony. In a single instant I knew without any doubt that that was what I wanted to be doing for the rest of my life.
15. If you had to pursue a career outside of music, what would you like to do?
Foam rubber sales with shrink packaging technology.
16. If you could invite any three people, living or dead, to a night of poker, who would you choose and why?
I would invite the first three generations of great double bass virtuosi; the Italians Domenico Dragonetti (1763-1846) and Giovanni Bottesini (1821-99), as well as the Russian, Serge Koussevitsky (1874-1951). I don’t like poker that much but I do enjoy playing bass quartets and I would like to hear what those guys really sounded like. I am pretty sure that Serge would be playing the fourth part.
17. What aspects of your profession do you like the most, and least?
A good life in music means learning and growing and evolving every day. When politics or economics get in the way of that, that’s the worst.
Also I hate wearing tails; they are very uncomfortable.
18. What is your guilty pleasure?
It’s not guilt so much as being ashamed to admit to watching all the truly dumb TV shows I watch. I’m happy The Love Boat went off the air.
19. What is the best thing you have ever bought, borrowed or stole?
Bought: my Italian bass which was made in 1630.
Borrowed: I borrowed a very rare old English bass for a year from a good friend of mine.
Stole: when my first bass teacher died we were both playing together in the Toronto Symphony. I went to his bass locker and stole the mute off his bass; not only as a momento but also that type of mute hadn’t been made for 30 years and I needed one.
20. When and how do you expect to die, and what would you like your headstone to read?
Could happen anytime and most probably by being run over by the beer truck. If I am truly proud of anything it is my children, so my headstone should say, “Father of Quillan and Caitlin.”
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