For a lot of people, being able to play one instrument pretty well is an accomplishment.
But, R.P. Hale isn’t like most people. Actually, put all his abilities into one neat little basket and we’d go out on a limb and say there’s not really anybody out there quite like Hale. At least not that we’ve come across in our travels around Concord and Bow.
Unless you’re a musician or really into music, odds are you’ve never heard of a harpsichord, clavichord, box virginall harpsichord or hammered dulcimer – and if you have, you have no idea what each looks or sounds like.
That’s okay, neither did we. Luckily for us, Hale enjoys playing his instruments and gave us a little private performance so we’d know what each one sounds like. We had no idea that the piano got its shape from the grand harpsichord or that these instruments all predate their piano counterpart. Seeing them in action is pretty neat. Google it and you’ll see what we mean.
“These instruments are capable of a lot of expression,” Hale said.
Piano is actually the instrument Hale started on, but after being introduced to the clavichord, he was done with the piano.
“My piano teacher realized I wasn’t really piano material and I found the piano rather boring,” he said. “A few years later I turned to the harpsichord and never looked back.”
But there weren’t a lot of gigs playing the harpsichord in Tucson, Ariz., where he grew up.
“There’s a lot you can do in Tucson, but being a harpsichordist isn’t one of them,” Hale said. But it turns out New England is a great place to play the instrument and it’s also where his wife, Alice (who wasn’t his wife then), lived.
“Alice kept me here,” he said.
In addition to being an accomplished musician, he has built the instruments he plays on, does wood engravings and marble papering, is a print maker, calligrapher, astronomer and has three printing presses in his workshop. We know, talk about an eclectic grouping of talents, but we’ll get more into that stuff later on.
The reason we’re giving you the lowdown on Hale is that he’s performing Wednesday night at the Concord City Auditorium, the opening act of the Walker Lecture Series spring session. And it’s all free. That’s right, you just have to show up to the Audi on Wednesday evening, pick a seat and let Hale do all the work.
The doors open at 7 p.m. and the show begins at 7:30 p.m. There are no tickets, no assigned seats – just a free concert with music that you’ve almost certainly never heard of. Unless you’ve seen Hale in concert. Hale, who is of Mexican descent, will play all four of the above mentioned instruments, with music from the Aztec Empire all the way through the end of the 18th century with his show, La Musica Gloria de Mexico.
“It’s gonna be the Mexican repertoire,” Hale said. “It’s always popular because it’s never heard. Why do I want to sound like a bunch of other harpsichordists?”
And this can be considered something of a treat because Hale prefers to be accompanist and doesn’t do a lot of solo shows. But the people at the Walker Lecture Series asked, so that’s why he’ll be taking the stage. Although that isn’t really how he likes to perform either.
“I hate stages. I’m in one place and the audience is in another,” Hale said.
He prefers to be surrounded by the audience, how things in the good ol’ days used to be. He also enjoys catching a performance as well.
“I love going to other people’s concerts and watching them work,” he said.
Just don’t spend a lot of time looking for a program on your way into the Audi because there won’t be one. Instead, Hale will be narrating as he bounces between the four instruments. But there will be absolutely no singing.
“When I sing it rains,” Hale said. “So no singing.”
As you can see, Hale is quite the musician, and if you don’t believe us, just check out the show. Did we mention it’s free?
Like we said before, Hale has made a lot of instruments, like 44 since 1978, and all the ones he’ll be playing Wednesday.
“I was too poor to buy them back then, and I’m too cheap to buy them now,” Hale said.
He’s also finished quite a few others.
“If you really want to finish a harpsichord, you really need to know how to play them,” Hale said.
Now back to Hale’s other talents. He’s the calligrapher for the state Supreme Court and has worked with multiple poet laureates to re-create poems that also features his original art.
“There’s always calligraphy running through here,” he said.
His wood engraving prints have graced the pages of the Insider before and he did a pretty sweet one for Concord 250. And as you can probably guess, it’s a pretty tedious operation.
“Line by line by line,” Hale said. “It’s a whole lot of simple steps that you build up, but they have to be done right and in the same order.”
He’s also a senior educator in astronomy, archaeo-astronomy, spectroscopy and general physics at the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center.
So how many jobs does Hale have?
“It depends on what day of the week you talk to me,” he said.
And if you can’t make this week’s performance (we know it’s a little last minute), Hale will be performing at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on March 14 at 12:15 p.m. for a little lunch time concert. Happy listening!
