Category Archives: Users

“It wasn’t ‘just’ a pencil…” A few words with composer Juliana Hall

01 Sunday Oct 2017

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A friend recently sent me a photo of Juliana Hall composing at the piano with an Eberhard Faber Blackwing 602. Since posting the photo here, I’ve been in touch with Juliana and she graciously agreed to answer a few questions. Her thoughtful responses reveal how a pencil can become something more than just a writing tool.

Do you recall when you first came across Eberhard Faber Blackwing pencils? Were they recommended to you by a friend/colleague, or were they something you happened upon by chance?

I had mainly been a pianist until I was 26, at which point I was a piano performance major in grad school at the Yale School of Music…however, through the years I had composed a few pieces in “composing for performers” types of classes.  So when I entered Yale, I chose to actually study composition with a visiting professor (Frederic Rzewski) as one of my electives.

When the Yale composition faculty heard the songs I had written, they encouraged me to change my major from piano to composition…which, with their help, I did.  But I was new to being a composer, so I was looking for a really good pencil, and I asked a classmate of mine whom I really liked what she used and she recommended the Blackwing 602.  (A few years ago that classmate, Julia Wolfe, won the Pulitzer Prize.)

What were your sources for buying Blackwing pencils? Did you have to special order them, or were they generally in stock?

There used to be an art supply store on Chapel Street in New Haven, very close to the British Art Center and the Architecture School.  They sold the Blackwings during my time as a student and, if memory serves, they always had Blackwings available.

After Yale I went to study with the famous vocal composer Dominick Argento in Minneapolis, but I returned to New Haven to get married and once again begin a new life.  The art supply store closed a few years later, but my husband found a stationary supply store in the next town over, Hamden, and we used to buy Blackwings by the box.  One of my husband’s yearly Christmas gifts to me was a gross of Blackwings.

It was a shocking and very sad day when we drove over to buy some more pencils and the shop owner informed us that Blackwings were no more.  We bought what was left of his stock…but, of course, they eventually ran out.

Some find it difficult to understand how musicians and writers could be choosy (or so precious) to the point that they even have a preference for which pencils they use. But a writing utensil lies at a unique junction: the point through which one’s imagination is rendered tangible. Therefore it’s not surprising that the tactile experience of writing can become intimately associated with the act of composing. What role then, if any, has your preference in writing tools played in your work as a composer?

My transition from pianist to composer was a somewhat magical time in my life, a time when I seemed to be guided towards what I really was…and what work I would really do…for my time here on Earth.

The Blackwing was wrapped up in that, it was a part of that magic for me.  It wasn’t “just” a pencil, but a friend, and my connection to that paper as my ideas became real.  I loved the look of the Blackwing’s graphite on the page, and even the scent of the pencil as I worked was pleasant.

It had a sort of “old-time” feeling, because it wasn’t a machine or a computer…it was very human in its warmth, and it provided a cozy feeling as I drew the notes, the dynamics, hairpins, lyrics, and all the things that formed my compositions.

I miss the Blackwing days, as now everything is computerized…and that certainly makes many things easier for me, too…so I have gone the way of the computer as well.

But there will always be a special place in my heart for the Blackwing 602, and for the time we shared as I became a composer with it…I’ve never found a pencil I liked more.

Thanks to Juliana for taking the time to share her thoughts. This interview is part of an ongoing project to document the life and times of the Eberhard Faber Blackwing 602, and its place in writing culture.

Don Bluth

26 Sunday Feb 2012

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© Vince Streano/CORBIS

Don Bluth is another legend in the field of animation. A quick online search also revealed that after leaving the Walt Disney Company in 1979, he went on to direct such notable films as The Secret of NIMH, An American Tail, and The Land Before Time. Currently, he is the owner of his own independent studio, Don Bluth Films.

I wonder if animators were likely to wear down their pencils to the very end. If cost and availability aren’t a factor, how low do you go before you inaugurate a new pencil? In the case of the Blackwing the ferrule almost acts like an extender, i.e. your fingers have a little something extra to grasp.

Musical Barber-ism

15 Wednesday Feb 2012

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Another photograph of Samuel Barber, Blackwing 602 in-hand.

Here is a link to a program from the WPR show To the Best of Our Knowledge, which addresses why it is we seem to love sad music. Featured in the segment is Barber’s Adagio for Strings.

While I can understand and appreciate the author’s sentiment, that Barber’s Adagio is the “saddest music ever written”, I think attempting to affix such a designation only serves to harm: music’s capacity to convey emotion is only limited when such an artificial boundary is imposed upon it. My feeling has always been that music and the rest of the arts in general are resistant to qualifiers such as “best” or “worst” etc. If such a thing as “best” (or any superlative) exists in music aesthetics, that means an immediate and irrevocable limit is in place from the start: as a performer then I’m either consigned to know there is a “best” performance that I haven’t reached, or if I do, it suggests there is nothing more that can be learned from that piece.

Music isn’t compatible with finding limits, superlatives, or absolutes with regard to aesthetics and even if it were, there’s little to be gained in finding them. And to argue such designations is rarely about the music—it’s usually more about the person doing the arguing.

 To suggest that there is some ostensible end to be reached anywhere in music is, I think, to incalculably miss the point.   

Nelson Riddle with Peggy Lee

14 Tuesday Feb 2012

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© EMI Music

Nelson Riddle has already been listed here as being a Blackwing user, but this relatively new photo (with Blackwing in tow) bears mentioning him again. Among well-known Blackwing users Riddle was one of the few who went so far as to mention the 602 as being one of his favorite tools. From Arranged by Nelson Riddle (Alfred Music Publishing, 1985):

Pencils should be of very soft lead, so that a minimum of pressure is needed to convey the marks to the paper, but the lead should be dense enough to be able to carry a sharp point, since clarity is essential. My favorite pencil is the Blackwing #602, by Eberhard Faber, but there may be many brands equal or superior to the Blackwing.

I wonder if Eberhard Faber ever took notice when such endorsements were made, especially since it may have translated into actual sales given Nelson Riddle’s notoriety and popularity.  Let’s hope they at least sent him a few “thank you” boxes.

Ferdie Grofé

12 Sunday Feb 2012

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© 1963 Bettmann/CORBIS

Ferdie Grofé (1892-1972) was a composer, arranger, and pianist. Known also as the “Prime (or Prince) Minister of Jazz” (working under Paul Whiteman, who was sometimes referred to as the “King of Jazz”), Grofé became widely recognized for his arrangement of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue in 1924. Originally composed for two pianos, the lush, colorful version that most are familiar with is Grofé’s arrangement. His well-rounded career included conducting, teaching at The Juilliard School, and composing for film.

I wonder if the container found between the score and the sharpener is the bottom of the Blackwing box; it looks right.

Whenever I see photographs of people holding a Blackwing and it’s missing an eraser, I often wonder whether it was taken out on purpose. The word that first comes to mind when I think about the Blackwing’s original eraser is “ironic”.

Paul Carlson

26 Thursday Jan 2012

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The discipline with which the Blackwing is perhaps most strongly associated is animation, about which Chuck Jones once said:

“…a flurry of drawings created by a Blackwing pencil; animation that dignifies itself as craft—a dying craft of aging men.”

Paul Carlson began his career at Disney working in the mailroom, but would eventually rise to the position of assistant director. He worked on such notable films as The Lady and the Tramp and Sleeping Beauty. He also worked on Mr. Magoo, and continues to animate today.

Hand-drawn animation, Eberhard Faber Blackwing 602 pencils, and “starting in the mailroom”— each artifacts of a bygone America.

Admittedly I know very little about the rich and storied history of animation in the United States, and in particular, the work of the artists at Disney. But as I read more about it I am struck by the sense of brotherhood and sisterhood found among animators, both young and old. And isn’t an exclusionary, “it’s-our-treehouse” sort of thing either—it appears to be very inclusive, with even the most stalwart of computer animators mantling a sense of stewardship for this “dying craft”. Of course, mine is the perception of an interloper who is likely just hoping this is the case. But, if you’re an animator and would be willing to share some of your thoughts, please leave a comment.