We get so much sheet music sent to us by various publishers year ’round—literally hundreds of pieces in every setting imaginable (solo guitar, multiple guitars, guitar-flute, guitar-harp, etc.)—but we don’t have the space to write about the great majority of them in our four quarterly issues each year.
So, just as we are now listing new classical guitar CD releases every other Tuesday here, we now use the Tuesdays in between those to announce new print music releases. As with the CDs, these are not reviews per se (some will be reviewed in the magazine, but frankly most will not), but we think it’s important to at least get the word out about what’s being offered to guitarists out there. Where possible, we’ve linked the titles to the publisher’s website or some other outlet where it can be purchased, and stated the degree of difficulty (if provided by the publisher or it’s obvious). —Blair Jackson
Here is a link to our previous listings from October 25, November 8, November 22, December 6, December 20, January 3, January 17, January 31, February 14.
Salvatore Seminara
Quattro Pezzi Sorprendenti (for guitar and cello)
Les Productions D’Oz, 12 pp. plus part
From the Italian composer’s notes accompanying the piece: “I particularly enjoy composing instrumental parts on a pre-existing piece following the example of some great composers of the past. This work started from four outstanding original studies by Fernando Sor which, although never banal, sound simple and therefore suitable to be integrated with an additional melodic part, which is almost always predominant. The intent is not to emulate the style of the famous Spanish author but to give new life to these studies in a spontaneous, playful way.” Intermediate.
Máximo Diego Pujol
3 Pièces: Villa Pueyrredón, Plaza Italia, Villa Real (solo guitar)
Editions Henry Lemoine, 12 pp.
Advertisement
Prolific Argentinean composer composer returns to his roots for a trio of appealing pieces, which he says evoke “three districts of Buenos Aires of great importance to my personal history. Villa Pueyrredón is the district where I was born. Villa Real was the neighborhood of my youth, were large, popular festivities were held during Carnaval. And the Plaza Italia is a square [and park] located just in front of the zoo.” Advanced.
Here’s a pretty version of Plaza Italia, performed by Kevin Loh:
W. A. Mozart
Fantasy in D minor KV 397 (for guitar and flute)
Doblinger, 8 pp.
For the past 15 years, flautist Noémi Győri and guitarist Katalin Koltai, both Hungarians, have played together in the Dialogue Duo and also worked to establish the Classical Flute and Guitar Project, the aim of which is “to create a new canon for the ensemble, [through] our own transcriptions of Viennese classical keyboard works that represent the finest compositional techniques and musical rarities from the time the flute-guitar duo was born. We aspire to redefine the historically developed perception and attitude to the duo, and to present the musical possibilities provided by the elaborate instruments in use today.” This particular piece was written for solo piano, but not completed before the composer’s death. It is believed that the ending of the piece was written by a Mozart acolyte named August Eberhard Müller, first published in 1806. This is the first piece to be published in Doblinger’s “Classical Flute and Guitar Collection.”
Watch/listen to Győri and Koltai’s arrangement of the piece here:
Michel Dalle Ave
Island of Skye (solo guitar)
Les Productions D’Oz, 2 pp.
Short but very appealing folkish piece inspired by a breathtakingly beautiful island off the coast of Scotland, which you can see in this music-with-still-photos YouTube video. Intermediate.