I happened to have a camera with me in Portland the other day and I heard some music coming from Pioneer Square.
His name is Andrew Gorny. He said it was ok to record and post his performance on YouTube. This is my first YouTube upload! I recorded it with a little Canon S95
pocket cam. Not a bad camera.
I can see myself doing a lot more of this with such a nice little camera to keep in my pocket. Next time I won’t move it around quite so much while I’m recording.
I think it was 1968 in the Santa Monica Public Library when I first heard Renata Tarragó play. I was all of 14, sitting at a table with earphones on, listening intently. It was something I did often in those days. I’d hitchhike to the library from Venice on an early evening and pore over their treasure chest of classical guitar recordings. I’d select two or three and bring them to the desk and ask the librarian to put one on the turntable. Then I’d take a seat at the table along with a few other listeners, put on the headphones and put my head down and listen. Sometimes I’d ask the librarian to repeat the playing, sometimes I’d move on to the next recording. After a few hours the library would close and I’d hitch back home with a head full of music.
This is where I discovered Narciso Yepes, Alirio Diaz, Pepe Romero, Julian Bream, and the player who was to be my idol all through my youth, Christopher Parkening.
But back to Renata Tarragó. I remember listening several times to her playing the Aranjuez. I would imagine myself playing it someday (which, alas, never happened and never will). I remember thinking how much I would like to see her play. All these years I never saw her play.
Well, thanks to the wonder of YouTube, here she is. Plus you get to see Michael Caine pulling off a heist. How good is that.
Koshkin’s cycle of preludes and fugues continues to emerge…
Nikita Koshkin and Asya Selyutina again. Beautiful stuff. This is what we need. Kudos to filmmaker Roman Gurochkin, too.
Nikita Koshkin says,
“The score of the complete cycle will be published in Germany by Editions Margaux (Berlin). But only after the premiere recording will be out. The recording is now in preparation. I hope that Asya will do everything as fast as possible, but the material is very heavy and difficult. It needs a lot of work. So, please, wait.”
While we wait, we have this from filmmaker Roman Gurochkin. I like the sound here better than on some of his others I’ve posted. I hear not just the guitar, but the room, too. There is some distance, some dimension, but without sacrificing intimacy.
Filomena Moretti performs Recuerdos de la Alhambra, by Francisco Tarrega.
This is cool. Bill Harris composed and performed this accompaniment to the Danza from Orbon’s great Preludio y Danza for classical guitar, as performed (brilliantly) by classical guitarist Manuel Barrueco on his recording Brouwer, Villa-Lobos & Orbon.
There’s a great guitar lesson here for any guitar player. In this beautiful example of “less is more,” Seasick Steve delivers the Hank Williams classic I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.
“Hobos are people who move around looking for work, tramps are people who move around but don’t look for work, and bums are people who don’t move and don’t work. I’ve been all three.”
Hear that lonesome whippoorwill
He sounds too blue to fly
The midnight train is whining low
I’m so lonesome I could cry
I’ve never seen a night so long
When time goes crawling by
The moon just went behind the clouds
To hide its face and cry
Did you ever see a robin weep
When leaves began to die?
That means he’s lost the will to live
I’m so lonesome I could cry
The silence of a falling star
Lights up a purple sky
And as I wonder where you are
I’m so lonesome I could cry
Something a little different.
A cool combination. This is from Chuck Cleckler.
