Marco Taio - Cantico di Sora Luna, Guitar Works (2018)

Spanish virtuoso guitarist Andrés Segovia liked to describe the classical versus the flamenco guitar as “one hill with two different slopes, which coexist”. This is also a suitable description for the classical guitar of the 19th century compared with that of the 20th century since, while the two slopes of the hill coexist, they each have a different exposure: one to the sun and the other to the shadow.

If we look at the ‘shadowy’ slope we see the 19th century guitar, still currently favoured by many guitarists because of its undeniable historical value. And so we think about the black and white pages of the 19th century masters with their studies, contra dances, waltzes, minuets, themes and variations, and about a handful of important concerts for guitar and orchestra. In contrast, if we look at the ‘sunny’ slope of the 20th century classical guitar, we discover pages full of energy and colour such as those by Albéniz, Torroba, Barrios, Bach, Scarlatti as well as many great concerts by Rodrigo, Ponce, Lauro, Villa-Lobos and Castelnuovo-Tedesco, just to mention the best-known ones.

In the second decade of the 19th century, classical guitar experienced the peak of its splendour. It’s large body of followers seemed to be glad of the final happy ending of a long and difficult way undertaken by Federico Moretti around the second half of the 18th century. Now, they set their sights on the delicious fruits of the massive editorial production of sonatas, fantasies, serenades, elegies, rondos, funeral marches and an infinite series of paraphrases of opera arias. The guitarist, like a nightingale who ‘fills himself with his own song’, doesn’t realize that in the meantime, the great instrumental music goes on in its incessant way of renewal.