Cool Beans: Cello Duets
by Celia Cobb and Naomi Yandell
- Instrumentation
- Cello, Cello
- Composed
- 2023
- Publisher
- Stainer & Bell
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About this piece
Cool Beans is a set of 21 character duets for pupil and teacher by Celia Cobb and Naomi Yandell, both Cambridge string teachers. Stainer & Bell published it in January 2023 in separate violin, viola and cello editions (cello: H509). Each book contains a full score and a separate pupil's part, with practice notes at the back. The publisher calls the set 'an eclectic mix' designed 'to build confidence in ensemble playing from an early stage'. Reviewing it in The Strad (June 2023), Davina Shum wrote that the pieces range from 'simple tunes comprising open strings and basic fingerings' at about Grade 1 to 'more complex syncopated rhythms, tonalities and position changes' bordering on Grades 2–3. Shum called the collection 'varied, vibrant and versatile'. In Music Teacher, Nina-Marie Plapp called it 'a compendium full of musical humour'. She singled out Matchday March (triplets), Mind the Gap (irregular time signatures) and Tango Waltz (syncopation), and noted harmonics and left-hand pizzicato. For cello it is set for ABRSM Initial Grade (After the Storm, On the Go) and Grade 1 (Cool Beans), and on Trinity's lists from Initial to Grade 3.
Technical overview
21 short duets, from Simon Says and Marble Run to Bark Double and Museum Piece, with the pupil playing the upper or lower line against the teacher. According to the publisher and reviews, they progress from open strings and basic first-position fingerings to syncopation, triplets, 5/4 and other irregular metres, position changes, harmonics and left-hand pizzicato. The score itself was not seen.