Ask someone on the street about classical guitar, and the response your’re likely to get is “what’s that?” It’s not uncommon for me to have to take five minutes to explain the concept of classical music played on the guitar before the other person begins to get it. “Oh, so, like…..Mozart, but, er, on guitar?” Yea. Something like that.
However, the common buffoon is not entirely to blame. Classical guitarists themselves have (largely) done a wonderful job of doing everything in their power to resist originality, personality, and the process of championing their craft to the general public. This is in stark contrast to jazz and contemporary musicians, who are required to create original material, develop a unique persona, and shove it in every face they can simply to exist.
One of my personal goals is to expand a classical guitar repertoire that, while containing many gems, has too much stale and redundant material that fails to engage listeners. While a lot of it makes delightful background music, there isn’t nearly enough that is exciting, engaging, interesting, and appealing to today’s listeners. Most great classical guitar music was penned in the 18th and 19th centuries, and not a whole hell of a lot has happened since. Of course there are some exceptions: Andrew York, Ralph Towner, Roland Dyens, and many others have created some incredible music while pushing the boundaries of what can be considered classical guitar music. Others like my colleague Larry Cooperman have made a career out of being on the cutting edge of avant-garde art music for the guitar. Larry has a lot of wonderful insights on all this stuff I’m blabbing on at his website, for exampe his review of Prester John’s CD here.
A portrait of Segovia by Manuel Diez Rollan
Part of the problem is the Segovia tradition. It’s awfully hard to say anything negative about the man who proliferated classical guitar music and refined the technique upon which every classical guitarist’s foundation is laid. Still, Andres Segovia was a purist, a musical snob, and one who refused to perform anything that sounded too modern, too dissonant, or too different from his vision of what guitar music should be. This mindset has trickled down to many guitarists, who themselves stick to the same old rep instead of pushing their boundaries. I wonder what the world would be like if doctors were trained this way. Forget cutting edge research, we’d still have a bunch of folks prescribing the use of leeches.
If there is any positive to take from this, it’s that there is ample room for innovation. Some ideas – the use of jazz harmony, improvisation, electric/steel-string instruments, and effects, to name a few – have long been standard fare in the guitar world outside of the CG bubble, yet are in their infancy in the classical guitar realm. It’s time that more guitarists embrace the 21st century and utilize all that is at their disposal to further their art. Doing so would be good for the art and artists, and even better for the everyday buffoon who could surely benefit from a touch of accessible, interesting contemporary art music in his or her life.
The Los Angeles Electric 8, playing classical music as an electric guitar octet
