Peter Rist : Cordoba ( Suite in 6 Movements ) : Bergmann

Peter Rist

Bergmann Edition : 12 pages

Canadian – born guitarist Rist has here written a set of six short pieces all named after places in Cordoba, and hence the music is very Spanish sounding throughout .

The difficulty factor here is modest but not too difficult, but the trouble lies as soon as you start playing the individual movements.

The opening movement Las Calles de Cordoba is in Em 6/8 time, and is very much a run of quavers with longer bass notes underneath. The problem had is that there is little imaginative writing here. You find a very obvious set of arpeggios, using Em, Am, B7, C, G, and D throughout its 50 bars of music, and the music is frankly a little boring.

Una Chica en un Portal is only 16 bars long, and is an A Major 4/4 piece, and is unfortunately the proverbial three – chord trick, A, E, and D, consisting of a quaver melody atop, longer bass notes, with no real character to it, to make it worth playing.

Las Fuentes de Cordoba is a relatively simple tremolo piece in 4/4 Em, that uses exactly the same chords as the opening piece, namely, Em, Am , B7, C, G, and D.

A la Plaza del Potro is in D Major and 4/4 , and has all the same very obvious characteristics of the previous pieces, and is a run of quavers with a longer noted bass line underneath.

Praeludio Flamenco al Baile has all the standard flamenco characteristics you might be expecting, namely, holding a B chord at fret 7, with the top two stings open , and play and upward and downward arpeggio Then , move that shape down to fret 5 for an A chord, and repeat the pattern. Finally move down to Fret 2 and repeat the shape and pattern with this F# major chord. Then the piece resorts to runs of very small notes, in large groups of hammer – ons and pull – offs finishing with a rasgueado chord, in other words every single standard flamenco style of music without any real character to it.

Finally Bailarines en las Calles de Cordoba is an Em 6/8 , where all the chords are to be played Rasgueado , and where again the only chords used are Em, D, C, and G

Sorry , but this was completely lacking in anything original , or even remotely interesting to play , and I would be extremely surprised if any real guitarists would play this and enjoy what it had to say.

Chris Dumigan