Ken Murray Les Productions D’Oz: 8 pages   Ken Murray’s compositions are many and varied and his guitar work as a performer and recording artist are superb and second to none. So a new piece from him is always something to look forward to. In spite of the cover photo of Shanghai, the piece itself is based on the Australian slang for as slingshot, and therefore the music does not have any oriental sounds to it!   Set in A Major with a Dropped D 6 th  its Con Spirito marking te

Leonardo Bravo Les Productions D’Oz: 3 pages     This folk styled piece by Argentinean guitarist Leonardo Bravo is a short but fun piece that has the time signature of 3/4 6/8, so it becomes immediately obvious that the Latin styled music is full of a mixture of the two time signatures , often in the same bar. It is also an Allegro of 160 crotchets a minute so it does really go right from the outset. At only 48 bars (with a complete repeat) it moves smartly but doesn’t stay a

Dusan Bogdanovic Doberman – Yppan : 16 pages   This Yugoslavian composer’s music is very different from any other composer’s music as anyone who has heard, or seen some of it will recognise. The first thing you notice about this four movement work is just how very complex the actual music pages look, when you first open the volume. For example on page one , which consists of 17 bars of music there are the following time signatures 2/4, 6/8, 7/8, 3 / 4, 11/16, 5/8, 7/16, 4/4,

Dusan Bogdanovic Doberman – Yppan: Score and Separate Parts: 8, 4, and 4 pages respectively This composer is one of the most well – known in the guitar world with a great many publications and recordings of his works, although interestingly he has written for many other instruments /voices including ballets, piano works and even a work for 16 ceramic gongs in collaboration with Stephen Freedman, sculptor! This latest work, dedicated to the Kupinski Guitar Duo has 4 sections,

Stephen Goss Doberman – Yppan : 15 pages   You always know that when you come across a Stephen Goss piece, it will be completely different from any other composer, and this latest piece is no different from that. The Preface tells the story of the piece in that the characters, being from the Commedia Dell ‘Arte , namely  Pierrot, Harlequin and Coliumbina are interacting with each other. Columbina is considering choosing one of them as a partner.So in this piece which is a se

Francesco di Giandomenico Les Productions D’Oz: Score and separate parts, 16, 6, 7, 6, and 6 pages respectively   This is the second publications I have seen recently from this composer, and is quite a different work than its predecessor. It is by the way part of the Chuck Hulihan Collection The first thing is that the pieces are much more moderate in their difficulty to the other book. All the three pieces here are in four parts but they are definitely playable by reasonable

Francesco Di Giandomenico Les Productions D’Oz: Score and separate parts (18, 5, 4, 5, and 5 pages respectively)   If you want a taster of this piece, there is a very grief 58 seconds section on YouTube, and that will show you part of the first section only, but it does give you an idea of what sort of music it is. After a slow, expressive opening on guitar 4 an accelerando leads to the Con Fuoco, which is the main theme, and where guitar 4 now plays a low  fast and furious m

Giacomo Susani Doberman – Yppan : Score and separate parts (20, 9 and 12 pages respectively )   Susani, a London – based player, composer, and performer has produced here a three – movement work in a modern but tonal style. It opens with a bouncy rhythmed Allegro Festoso which begins with its first theme in 4/4, but with plenty of cross rhythms, rather than 4 crotchets with the melody beginning on the clarinet accompanied by some colourful chords, before swapping at bar 15 wi

Ramses Calderon Les Productions d’Oz: 12 pages   Calderon heralds from El Salvador and here are 4 pieces from his large compositional repertoire that , generally speaking , are for advanced players only. The opening piece El Colibri is perhaps the most difficult. It begins with a four bar introduction that jumps around the notes in an Em chord, but with half of the notes requiring a trill. This then leads to almost the entire remainder of the piece (33 bars, and nearly 5 page

Edwin Guevara Gutierrez Bergmann Edition: 11 pages   This composer has a very impressive musical life, too many things  to go into now but suffice it to say that they are huge and varied. The Bambuco is  a traditional Colombian music and dance genre from the Andean region, characterized by a waltz-like rhythm with roots in Spanish, indigenous, and African musical styles . It is known for its expressive melodies and intricate rhythms and that is definitely the case here with t

Michel Cardin Bergmann Edition : 32 pages score only   This book follows on from my previous review as it has the remaining 10 pieces that Cardin arranged in this manner, from the full batch of about 600 French and Acadian songs collected in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia by archivists Anselme Chiasson and Daniel Boudreau between 1942 and 1993.Their publication had only the melody and the words but no accompaniment, which is what Cardin has done very successfully here. Knowing

Michel Cardin Bergmann Edition: Score only: 32 pages   Here are ten songs out of a set of 20 published by Bergmann (Volume 2 has the other 10)which are from approximately 600 French and Acadian folk songs collected in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia by archivists Anselme Chiasson and Daniel Boudreau between 1942 and 1993.They were then subsequently published in 11 volumes by the two men, but with only the melody and the words, so Michel took a lot of pleasure in harmonising the

VALDERRABANO: Soneto 2 ;  Soneto 1: MILAN: Fantasia 8: NARVAEZ: Differencias Sobre ‘Guardame Las Vacas’: DA MILANO : Ricercar 16; Fantasia 28, Fantasia 32; Fantasia 61:PICCININI : Aria di Saravanda in Varie Partite; Corrente 11: DOWLAND: Sir John Smith, His Almain; Lachrimae;Tarleton’s Risserectione :ROBERT JOHNSON: Alman: CUTTING: Greensleeves: ANON: The Cobbler: ABEL: Allegro D Moll WKO208; Allegro D Moll: BACH: Sonate No2 A Moll BWV1003 – a)3- Andante ; b) 4 – Allegro: WEI

Francis Bebey Les Productions D’Oz: 3 pages   This short but melodic piece of writing is by a man who I first discovered through the playing and recordings of John Williams, quite a considerable time ago. The two pages about his life and his guitar work makes for fascinating reading. This little piece is in D Major with a dropped D 6 th and has a melody that returns a few times in the piece in slightly different guises as it progresses .It is generally in three voices, with

20 French – Canadian Children’s Songs for Voice and Guitar Michel Cardin Bergmann Edition:  32 pages (Score only)   This first volume of 20 songs (there is a second volume of 20 more) originated with a number of songs being sung on children’s television that were loved by Hélène Gosselin-Cardin and subsequently collected together with a view to making something out of them. So she asked a number of composers to add a number of others to the list,. Then Michel Cardin provided

Scott Fields Bergmann Edition : Score and separate  flute part : 12 and 4 pages respectively   This composer is a new name to me, but he is an American guitarist who has a number of bands who concentrate on modern elements such as the avant – garde and to a certain extent the experimental music .He also likes mixing notation with improvisation in some works so I was wondering just what I was going to be in for here, with this 90 odd bar piece for flute and guitar. The first t

Francois Couperin  (Arranged for guitar by Michel Cardin) Bergmann Edition : 7 pages   Couperin of course was a Baroque composer  Who played Harpsichord and Organ, and this piece is the fifth piece from the 1st Ordre and arranged for guitar by Michel Cardin. As with much Baroque keyboard music there are a large number of ornamental notes in multiple patterns throughout this piece, which do of course add to the difficulty of playing this fine piece.To give you an example the

MALATS Y MIARONS : Serenata Espanola:NARVAEZ: Diferencias on Guardame las Vacas ; Canción del Emperador (sobre "Mille Regretz" de Josquin des Prez) : LLOBET: Canco de Lladre (Thief's song) : El Testament d'Amelia (Amelia's Testament)  SOR:  Variations on a Scottish Theme, ‘Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonnie Doon’, Op. 40 : VILLA – LOBOS:   Suite populaire brésilienne: 2. Schottish-Chôro ;  Prelude No. 1: Homenagem ao sertanejo brasileiro ; Prelude No. 2: Homenagem ao Malandro Cario

Michel Cardin Bergmann Edition: 7 pages   This is a quite different piece from my previous review of his Un Canadien Errant stylistically and also as regards its technical difficulty, not that it’s not a fine piece to play because it is. It just has quite of lot of tricky parts, but then again, it is a Study! It is an Allegretto in 2/4 that begins in E minor, although the amount of other flats and sharps that it progresses through means that the key signature is often not qui

Michel Cardin Bergmann Edition : 5 pages   Michel is a well known name in the guitar fraternity and over the years he has produced lots of wonderful pieces. This one is based on a French Canadian folk song called ‘ J’ai fait une maitresse’. The piece is in E Major in 3 / 4 and is a gently flowing little piece that relies mostly on arpeggiated patterns  of a number of different styles with the melody peeping through the various arpeggios.As  long as you know your Es, As, C# mi