Ben Barron - Guitarist

A fine guitarist.

- Guitar Review

The Wynton Marsalis of the guitar.

- Dusan Bogdanovic, guitarist,
composer

Spirit of the Guitar is a collection of some of the most well-known and beloved pieces in the guitar repertoire. All of the pieces on this album are close to my heart. The title, “Spirit of the Guitar,” expresses the importance of these pieces to me.

With the exception of "Jazz Sonatina" and my own piece "Ode to Christopher," the works on this album were ones that I heard as a child and inspired me to play the guitar. They are some of the greatest works ever written for the guitar, and, in my opinion, it is no accident that they were written by composers from Spain, Brazil, Paraguay and Cuba. The guitar is an integral part of the Latin culture and, in turn, the very sound of the guitar as it is today owes its roots to this culture.

Now as to the exceptions: The Jazz Sonatina was written by brilliant Yugoslavian guitarist/composer Dusan Bogdanovic with whom I studied. He composed this great concert piece in 1992, which was during the time I studied with him and I learned it for the first time from the original manuscript written in his hand. I composed the piece here entitled "Ode to Christopher" when my brother John Christopher Barron (1960-2006) passed away suddenly. I was so grief-stricken that I felt a need to express my sorrow by writing a piece that reminded me of him. This CD is dedicated to my brother in loving memory.

Download the OneSheet in Acrobat format.


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Estudio in thirds - from "Spirit of the Guitar"
Ode to Christopher - from "Spirit of the Guitar"
Asturias - from "Spirit of the Guitar"
Sonata for guitar: Allegro moderato - from "20th Century Romantics"

Ben combines wonderful musicality with exceptional technique.

- George Sakellariou, virtuoso
guitarist

20th Century Romantics is a collection of pieces that are from a favorite period of Ben’s; the early 20th Century. It is a period characterized by wonderful, harmonic dissonance and melodies that can be haunting or strange or both, mixed with the flowing, romantic expression of the late 19th century.

This recording contains two monumental works written for the guitar between World War I and World War II, which are the Etudes for the Guitar (1924-1929) by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887-1959), and Sonata for the Guitar (1933) by Spanish composer Antonio Jose (1902-1936). Also included are the Seis Veriaciones (1944) by Joaquin Nin-Culmell (1908-2004), which is a fine work for guitar dedicated to the great Cuban guitarist Jose Rey De La Torre (1917-1994) and based on a theme of Luis de Milan. The last piece recorded here is Valse opus 8 no.4 (1923) by Augustin Barrios (1885-1944), a native of Paraguay. He wrote this waltz very much in the Viennese tradition.

Ben dedicated this recording to the virtuoso guitarist Jose Rey De La Torre with whom he studied while in his teens. Rey was a powerful influence in his development as a guitarist and in his love of this particular style and period of music.

Download the OneSheet in Acrobat format.