TO: All Stations

FR: Tony Morris

DT: January 21, 2020

RE: ***** CLASSICAL GUITAR ALIVE!   Music of Asia Minor: Hovhaness (Armenia), Theodorakis (Greece), Domeniconi, (Turkey), and more

In Cue: MUSIC IN “Hello and welcome to…”

Out Cue: “…another edition of Classical Guitar Alive!”

Program Length:58:57

INTRODUCTION:

  Bizet:  Carmen Suite: Prelude      Los Romeros, guitar quartet

                                    (Philips 412-609)

PROGRAM BEGINS:

   Dimitri Fampas: Greek Dance #1  Eva Fampas, guitar

                                    (Aulia 69001)

   Domeniconi: Koyunbaba          Xuefei Yang, guitar

                                    (Shine Horn 1029)

   Hovhaness: Guitar Concerto #1  David Leisner, guitar

                                                       Berlin Radio Symphony Orch.

                                                       Gerard Schwarz, conductor

                                   (Naxos 559294)

  Theodorakis: Two Epitafios         John Williams, guitar

                                   (Sony Classical 90399)

  Miroslav Tadic: Walk Dance      Scott Tennant, guitar

                                    (Sony Classical 89100)

CLOSING THEME/FUNDING CREDITS

This week’s edition of Classical Guitar Alive! features music from, or influenced by, the geographical location that has historically been identified as “Asia Minor,” and more, including music from Turkey, Armenia, Greece and Macedonia, by Dimitri Fampas, Carlo Domeniconi, Alan Hovhaness, Mikis Theodorakis, and Miroslav Tadic.

The program begins with the Greek Dance #1 by Dimitri Fampas (1922-1996), performed by the composer’s daughter, Eva Fampas. Dimitri Fampas was a student of Segovia and Emilio Pujol, Dimitri Fampas enjoyed a long and successful career as performing guitarist and composer.

Carlo Domeniconi’s exotic and hypnotic Turkish-influenced piece  “Koyunbaba” (“Shepherd’) has emerged as one of the most popular solo guitar works of the last 20 years. The piece is heard in an early recording by Chinese prodigy Xuefei Yang.

Commissioned by and dedicated to Bolivian guitarist Javier Calderon in 1978, the “Guitar Concerto No. 1” by Armenian-American composer Alan Hovhaness (1911-2000) was first premiered in 1979. However, a commercially-available recording of the piece was not issued until 2006 on the Naxos label featuring American guitarist David Leisner and the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Gerard Schwarz.

Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis (b. 1925) is best known for his film scores for “Zorba the Greek”, and “Serpico”, but has also composed symphonic, chamber, and stage works. His cycle of “Epitafios” is a setting of poems in a Greek folk instrument style of poems by Yannis Ritsos (1909-1990).

The program concludes with Scott Tennant performing Miroslav Tadic’s “Walk Dance”. The work is based on a Macedonian dance in 11/8 time: (2+2+3+2+2).

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