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Home Town: Tuson, Arizona
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Enjoy Music from
Gabriel Ayala's "Tango" Cd
Indigenous in the News Featured Artist Review
Gabriel Ayala - Tango!
By:
I roll out the driveway and head east down the midtown greenway headed for the West River Road, my favorite route in the early morning. This morning of romance and sunrise and cups of strong black coffee deserves the sweet sounds of beautiful flamenco guitar from internationally recognized classical guitarist Gabriel Ayala's (Yaqui) latest CD titled Tango.
The flamenco guitar is a slightly smaller, brighter and more percussive sounding version of the classical guitar and is made of Spanish cypress and spruce with gut strings and still has the old fashioned wooden tuning pegs. Flamenco guitars really started coming into their own with the advent of nylon strings and mechanical metal tuning pegs. Flamenco guitar involves some stylistic differences from what is considered classical guitar.
Tango is a style of music that originated in the immigrant communities of Argentina and Uruguay, known for the style of dance associated with the music, it is commonly played by a sextet(orquesta tipica) consisting of two violins, piano, double bass and two bandoneons(small hand-held accordion).
In American Ballroom tango, the "close embrace" involves close contact in the pelvis or upper thighs, but not the upper body. It occurs to me that I am doing the Tango in close embrace on my bike down the Minnehaha Blvd. bike trail as I wind smoothly but aggressively in a staccato rhythm through the trees next to the creek. Yeah this ride is a tango.
La Cumparsita is perhaps the most widely known of all tango melodies and was composed by Gerardo Matos Rodriguez (1897-1948) from Uruguay who was a giant in the world of Tango in the early 1900's.
Milongo del Angel, Buenos Aires Hora Cero, and Verano Porteno, were all composed by Astor Piazzolla (1921 -1992) an Argentine tango composer and bandoneon (small hand held accordion) player who created Nuevo tango by incorporating elements of jazz and classical music into the tango form.
The third track, Tango was composed by Francisco Tarrega (1852-1909), an important figure in the early establishing of the guitar as a concert and recital instrument.
Don Perez Freire was composed by Agustin Barrios Mangore, and contemporary guitar virtuoso John Williams has said, As a guitarist/composer, Barrios is the best of the lot, regardless of era. His music is better formed, it's more poetic, it's more everything!
Tango en Skai composed by Roland Dyens (b. 1955), the fifth trac on Ayala's Tango CD, is his most widely known piece. Skai is French for imitation leather and refers to the Gauchos of Argentina and Southern Brazil because they are known for the distinctive leather outfits they wear.
Por Una Cabeza was composed by Carlos Gardel (1890-1935) whose recordings and films more than anyone's are responsible for the spread of tango internationally.
The tango El Chocto was written by Angel Villoldo (1861-1919) who made the first ever tango recording.
This CD has work on it by all of the giants of Tango and is full of subtlety and nuance. It's been some time since I listened to some actual precise guitar work and this CD has that and more. This is genuine flamenco and this CD is full of the deepest most profoundly beautiful stylistic narratives on the evolution of Tango music. I am at peace with movement like dance when I ride and I think everything is going to be all right.
I'm riding the bicycle tango through the trees, watching the creek flow, thinking that tango flows like sex and sweat and blood, not like water. Tango is a brilliantly played collection of works by all of the pre-eminent tango composers of history. This beautiful guitar work inspires, cajoles, coaxes and tells lies like all great romances and I ride with Willa and seventh grade puppy love on my mind and in my heart. I always wanted to do the tango with you and I never did. I regret that. But regret doesn't stop no bike ride. This ride is for you. I remember you and those eyes like it was yesterday.
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Indigenous in the News Featured Artist Review
Gabriel Ayala - Portraits
By:
Today I'm going to practice some revolutionary tactics by riding and listening to Gabriel Ayala's newest CD Portraits a collection of classical guitar pieces.
This CD starts with the song Asturias (Leyenda) from Suite Espanola, a Spanish dance form composed by Isaac Albeniz. Asturias is an autonomous community within the kingdom of Spain situated on the Spanish north coast facing the Cantabrian Sea (Mar Cantabrico, the Spanish name for the Bay of Biscay), a territory once occupied by Celtic tribes. The most characteristic instrument in traditional music is the Asturian bagpipe, which has a single drone in common with the traditional bagpipes of other Celtic nations such as Wales & Ireland.
Asturias, the fifth movement of the Suite Espanola, Op. 47 by Spanish composer Isaac Albeniz. . .Originally written for piano, it features exemplary finger style classical pickin' played with indigenous passion. Many of Albeniz compositions were transcribed for guitar by Francisco Tarrega, one of a core elite of Spanish classical guitarists and is said to have enjoyed them more than for piano.
The Gymnopaedia in ancient Sparta was a yearly celebration during which naked youths displayed their athletic and martial skills through the medium of dancing. Public performances would generally be associated with an occasion such as a religious feast and focused on the beauty of the movements and not on the competitive aspects of the sport and the second track Gymnopedie No. 1 by Erik Satie certainly takes me back to the 60's and listening to this piece interpreted by Blood, Sweat and Tears. The Gymnopedies are regarded as the precursors to modern ambient music and it puts a tear in my eye as I stop by the lake to listen.
Agustin Barrios Mangore who is considered by many to be the first to commit classical music to a recording and was also known for his extremely exciting live performance style wrote Julia Florida the third track on the CD. He is known for having assumed a character for his performances for which he wore traditional Paraguayan dress as he was partly of Guarani origin. He was greatly influenced by Central and South American folk music. His compositions also are crafted in a style reminiscent of the Romantic and Baroque periods of classical music.
The fifth track Introduction and Variations on a Theme (O cara marmonia) from "The Magic Flute" by Mozart was composed by Fernando Sor who was born in Barcelona, Spain and is sometimes known as Beethoven of the Guitar. His compositions are technically complex and require virtuoso skill in rendering accurately. The Magic Flute is a singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue. It is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Mozart to a libretto (the lyrics) by Emanuel Schikaneder. This piece is generally recognized as one of Sor's most difficult pieces. There are several very difficult passages and it is a long piece.
Toccata & Fugue in D minor originally composed by Johann Sebastian Bach who is now widely considered to be one of the greatest composers in the Western tradition. Originally performed on Church organ this transcription for guitar is really something special. The guitar lends itself well to the passion and emotionality of the player. It's why we all love the guitar so much. It is said that Bach wrote this piece as a test for a new organ to see if the bellows would provide enough wind to maintain a steady pitch and good tone quality. Beethoven referred to Bach as the "father of harmony." Scientist and author Lewis Thomas once suggested how the people of Earth should communicate with the universe: I would vote for Bach, all of Bach, streamed out into space, over and over again. We would be bragging, of course, but it is surely excusable to put the best possible face on at the beginning of such an acquaintance. We can tell the harder truths later.
Farewell to Stromness composed by Peter Maxwell Davies is one of the cabaret style piano pieces included in The Yellowcake Review performed by Davies in protest to the uranium mining going on in Stromness, second largest town in the Orkney islands. The slow, walking bass line that pervades the Farewell portrays the residents of the village of Stromness having to leave their homes as a result of uranium contamination.
I knew that classical guitar CD would not be bike riding music per se but, it included a destination and that destination was my heart and the serenity that I feel sitting here by the Lake of the Isles as I listen with every fiber of my being to Gabriel Ayala's Portraits. Portraits, faces of people, human beings at their best.
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