Classical Guitar

Posted by: Wolf on 05 February 2003

On the radio last night I heard a member from the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet, name was William Kanengiser. Very intelligent discussion about the group and solo careers. Some great pieces were played. They have a new CD on Telarc 80593 of latin music from around the world. 4 gut string guitars sure sounded good on my kit and I'm sure it has a high WAF.

Kanengiser wrote a piece called Air and Ground on sony 89100 that was really wonderful. Started out Baroque but went thru the ages and was a real trip. Andrew York, who is in the group, also writes pieces, one was called Quiccan and another Pacific Coast Highway. They were really interesting to listen to.

They played recordings of Leo Brouwer, Ian Krause, Manuel De Falla and Morten Lauridsen. Fascinating to hear a whole area of contemporary music that I had no idea about. They also have transcribed some traditioanl stuff like Tchaikovsky Nutcracker Suite, which I didn't care for, Bizet Carmen Suite which was nice and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov: Capriccio Espagnol Op 34 which was really nice. Sure was a great evening.

I'm going to buy Kanengiser's solo recording as it's all contemporary works and quite unique. I finally had to go to sleep so couldn't hear the last hour of the program. More info on KUSC in case you're interested.

glenn

Posted on: 06 February 2003 by Sigmund

There's a wonderful disc of Morten Lauridsen's called "Lux Aeterna" available directly from rcmusa.com that I'm sure you'll like. For more wonderful classical guitar music, I'd also suggest the recent DG collection of Augustin Barrios with Alexander-Sergei Ramirez called "Confesion." For slightly more modern music, pick up what you can by Argentina's Santa Fe guitar quartet on Klavier. berkshirerecordoutlet.com recently had a few of their discs going for $1.99 each. For a great collection of modern Latin American stuff, I highly recommend Sharon Isbin's "Dances for Guitar" on Pro Arte. Great sound, too.

Posted on: 06 February 2003 by Wolf

Wow thanks for teh info I'll have to start a want list as I'm sure I'll loose the connection to this info.

Guitar can be so intimate and furious which is wonderful.

Posted on: 06 February 2003 by John Schmidt

As a (very) amateur player, I'm pleased to see some interest in classical guitar on the forum. The LAGQ are deservedly well-known, but I like even better a couple of recordings on the Swedish Opus 3 label (opus3records.com) called Guitar Kvartetten. The group plays instruments designed for different different pitch ranges, like a string quartet.It surprises me that more top-rank players haven't explored the possibilities afforded by the wider pitch range of this kind of approach.

Cheers,

John Schmidt
"90% of everything is crud" - Theodore Sturgeon

Posted on: 07 February 2003 by Wolf

William Kanengiser was talking about that. Said the group goes off to do their own thing for a while, exploring music and new instruments. they each play the guitar they like the way they like it instead of being four copies of each other and they make it work. They've been going for 22 years now and all met at USC's Thornton school of music under Pepe Romero. He feels the diversity of tallent and instrumentation is their strength.

I do listen to the "classic" pieces on radio but I found the contemporary stuff thrilling. One piece was for prepared guitar. Lots of interesting techniques on that. I have heard Lux Aeterna on radio and it is beautiful.