Posts from ‘Videos’
Michael Gratovich – Paolo Coriani
Here’s another video of guitarist Michael Gratovich, this time playing the Prelude and Allegro from Bach’s BWV 998 on a new Paolo Coriani ‘Manuel Ramirez’.
This isn’t exactly news, as it’s a video from 1987, but it’s a fun tribute to Segovia by Hugh Downs on 20/20, and there’s a great shot of a young Rafael Moreno Rodriguez in his original shop and some footage of the 1986 master class that Segovia gave at USC.
Here are some great videos of French players playing French guitars – Guitarist and composer Bernard Piris and his wife Brigitte Repiton playing their Dominique Field guitars (#198 from 2010 and #204 from 2011 respectively). You can read more about them here (if your French is good).
We have photos of our next guitar from French luthier Bertrand Ligier, which will be our second from him, and from the looks of the photos the guitar should be here any day now. In the meantime here’s a video of Sean Samimi playing Sergio Assad’s ‘Valseana’ on the first guitar we got from Ligier a few months back.
This week we have another video lesson from Scott Morris to go with his method Classical Guitar Complete – From Basics to Bach. This time he covers scales, how to practice them, how to better synchronize your left and right hands, and some mistakes to avoid when shifting.
Scott Morris came in and recorded a series of videos on warmup and technique – companions to his method ‘Classical Guitar Complete – From Basics to Bach’ volumes 1 and 2. In the first installment Scott gives us an introduction on the importance of warming up and of practicing technique, and then the second video deals with arpeggios and how to practice them. More videos will be coming in the next couple of weeks. Scott is playing a Masaki Sakurai ‘Maestro RF’ cedar guitar.
Taso Comanescu, who recently recorded some great videos for us (check them out here) came back to record some duos with Mak Grgic, this week, and while he was here we asked him to play a little on the new Lorenzo Frignani ’1910 Manuel Ramirez’ that just arrived. So Taso recorded Tarrega’s ‘Lagrima’ on this guitar, which sounded perfect for the piece.
Hungarian guitarist Andras Csaki came by GSI last week. He’s been touring the world and winning competitions since 1999 – you can read more about him here. He played Dowland’s ‘Farewell’ on a Sakurai-Kohno Professional-J spruce guitar and Barrios’ Vals Op. 8, No. 3 on a Thomas Norwood ’1932 Esteso’ model.
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From the Ramirez blog, here’s a really cool story about the 100th anniversary of Segovia’s first playing a Ramirez. The first video tells the story of Segovia getting that guitar and of Amalia Ramirez wanting to honor that moment 100 years later with John Mills.
“Andres Segovia first played Ramirez guitars in 1912, up to 1937, when he changed to the German maker Herman Hauser. In the early 1960’s he moved back to using Ramirez guitars, with a brand new design called the ‘Tradicional’ Model 1a, an instrument with a longer string length and larger fingerboard, using the then newly discovered Western Red Cedar wood for the soundboard, built specifically for Segovia. 100 years later, legendary British classical guitarist John Mills presents a series of national and international recitals in which he uses this special Ramirez guitar, kindly supplied by Amalia Ramirez. John plays a selection of pieces written for and transcribed by Segovia, including works by Tansman, Torroba, Haug and Castelnuovo – Tedesco. In the summer of 2013, a special double CD and booklet will be released as part of the project.”
Here’s me playing my Soleá on a really nice 2005 Lester DeVoe negra. Though it’s a 2005 this guitar looks like it’s brand new – not marks on it anywhere, and it sounds fantastic. As you can see, I mic’ed this guitar closer than I have in most of the previous videos, which is more like the way one would mic it for a recording or a live show.
