Finally we can talk about what this pile of yarn is for! (And why it’s inside a piano…)
What It’s All About
The notion of a shawl collection inspired by music has been kicking around in my head for at least a year now. Originally the idea was to use general musical terms (obbligato, allegro, fermata, etc.) as a springboard for shawls of all kinds—lace, cables, colorwork—about 15 or 20 or so of them. Eventually I realized that that’s a lot of shawls, and I didn’t know whether anyone out there was geeky enough (as geeky as me) to buy a book of that size, created around decidedly unfashionable music. Over time I whittled down the number of shawls and decided to start with a modest number of 4. The inspiration base also narrowed, because at some point after conceiving the project I discovered French art song.
One of the perks of being a voice student is discovering obscure (but glorious) music; many famous operatic tunes (O Mio Babbino Caro, anyone?) aren’t well suited to a young voice and still-developing technique, but many lesser-known works are. French mélodies are among my personal favorites, and while many can be sung by a student, at the highest level they require great artistic maturity to interpret.
This was the first jumping-off point for me in thinking about the shawls in this collection—shawls that could be made by a young, ambitious lace knitter, but appreciated and enjoyed by the virtuoso. As I listened to my favorite mélodies over and over, other concepts came into play. Elegance. Grace. Understatement. Timelessness, finesse, delicacy—even luminosity. All these elements, detectable in the music, could be translated logically into a knitted design.
So that is the (extremely nerdy) ambition of this collection: take 4 of these remarkable songs, transmute their qualities into lace, and hopefully draw fans of both (and create new fans of both). I’ve linked to some of my favorite songs below (not the four that inspired the book) to give you an idea of the mood and feel of this unique genre of music. And while I would love it if you fell for the songs, for their own sake, I hope you enjoy the shawls too.
How? When? Where?
Now that I’ve rambled on in my pie-in-the-sky way, I’ll get to the point. The four shawls will be released one at a time over several weeks as individual pdf patterns via the usual channels—Ravelry and Lovecrafts—for $6 apiece. If you’re interested, mark your calendar for September 2; the first pattern is in testing now and will be available for purchase on that date. Sneak peek below!
Now, this is where things get exciting. The four patterns will also be available as a pdf ebook from both channels; full price, the ebook will be priced at $20, a savings of $4 compared to buying the four patterns one at a time. Furthermore, from September 2 to the release of the second pattern (TBA), the ebook will be available for $14. With each successive release, the price of the ebook will go up until the fourth pattern is available, and the price will be set permanently at $20. Here’s a handy table to explain how it works:
- September 2 to Release #2—$14
- Release #2 to Release #3—$16
- Release #3 to Release #4—$18
- Release 4# and onward—$20
If it’s a little hazy now (it still gives me double-takes), things will become more clear as actual dates are announced; so stay tuned here for updates. The collection will also be available in print once the pdf patterns are published—hopefully some time before Christmas, so mentally shelf it (gotcha!) for any special knitters in your life.
Concluding Remarks
I think that’s all for now; except to say that I’m very grateful that I can now stop hinting and shilly-shallying away from telling you all about what’s been going on hereabouts! I hope you all will enjoy seeing these shawls as much as I will showing them off to you, and that they’ll leave you inspired to knit, listen to mélodies, or both (at the same time!).
Some Mélodies
Si mes vers avaient des ailes by Reynaldo Hahn, sung by Ruth Ann Swenson
