ISBN 9781513455044.

The presentation of this album marks a special event in classic guitar publishing! This anthology contains 11 truly representative examples of the folklore of Latin America, all highly revered folk songs considered jewels of the musical traditions of: Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela and Mexico. Artfully arranged by the renowned Mexican composer and guitarist, Guillermo Diego, students and professionals alike will discover multiple items of interest and important technical challenges while learning some of the most popular Latin-American folk tunes. To facilitate dialog between teacher and student, rehearsal numbers have been added at key points of each arrangement; additionally, the guitarist will find a handful of pieces faithful to various Latin-American styles composed by Diego. Written in standard notation only for the intermediate to advanced classic guitarist, these arrangements will make delightful additions to recital and concert programs. La presentacion de este album es una buena nueva para la guitarra; se trata de la publicacion de una antologia sumamente representativa de obras pertenecientes al Folklore latinoamericano, piezas por demas apreciadas y consideradas joyas de la tradicion musical. La musica incluida en este album abarca los siguientes paises: Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela y Mexico. Los arreglos, realizados de forma artistica y amorosa fueron realizados bajo el tamiz y experiencia del reconocido compositor y guitarrista mexicano, Guillermo Diego. Tanto estudiantes como profesionales, encontraran multiples puntos de interes y retos tecnicos importantes al abordar piezas notables de la musica latinoamericana.Como un elemento extra y para lograr el estudio mas eficaz de estas obras entre profesor y alumno, cada pieza cuenta con Numeros de Ensayo; adicionalmente, el guitarrista encontrara un punado de piezas fieles a diversos estilos latinoamericanos compuestas por Diego. Musica Tradicional Latinoamericana para Guitarra de Concierto, sin duda, una novedad para el mundo de la guitarra que aportara a los programas de concierto deliciosos ejemplos de la musica de America Latina.

Ernesto García de León's 20 Studies, Op. 50 is an ingenious collection thataddresses fundamental questions about how to develop and maintain guitar technique. It is designed toserve guitar teachers and students as well as performers and concert audiences. Since it explores notjust the technique of our instrument, but its musicaland expressive aspects as well, it makes daily technical work enjoyable, not tedious?even for someone only beginning to study the guitar.

For guitar teachers and students, 20 Studies canserve as a basic curriculum or it can complementother methods or other sets of studies. For performers, it provides a complete overview and tune-up ofthe guitar technique in one graded set of daily studies that can be played in less than half an hour. Thiswarm-up then provides the player delicious concertrepertoire?as the complete set, or in smaller groups,or in combinations with other music by ErnestoGarcía de León.

These musical exercises are also useful to rectify,reform or rehabilitate the guitar technique.

The materials out of which the twenty studies aredeveloped are first idiomatic patterns of the guitarand then the variety of musical styles so appealing toand characteristic of Ernesto García de León. For example, classic examples of the music of theCaribbean coastal basin in general and thecomposer's native state Veracruz in particular appearunvarnished in #12 (a rumba veracruzana) and #20(a son). The other studies blend elements of Mexicanmusic in general?songs of the revolution, nativedances, boleros, children's songs, and so forth?withelements of European classical music, Beatles, NewAge music, jazz and other musical styles, in a wayintended to appeal to the player and to the listener.

As the summary on pages 34 and 35 illustrates,the first sixteen studies explore basic formulas for theright hand. At the same time, they also address thefull range of left hand techniques?including balanceand positioning, independence of the fingers, longitudinal and transversal movements, shifts by substitution, by displacement, by jump, and by positions,barring, stretches and contractions, damping, pivoting, crossed movements, and movements with fixedfingers. The last four studies concern the slur.

Though each of the basic right- and left-hand formulas explored in the twenty studies is relativelysimple in itself, each is a building block of a solidtechnique. Mastery of the complete set of twentystudies?less than half an hour of music?integratesall the formulas and develops the technique to a levelat which an enormous range of the guitar repertoirebecomes available.

ISBN 9781609743536. In compiling this landmark sourcebook, Finnish guitarists Hannu Annala and Heiki Matlik consulted more than 70 music texts as well as dozens of composer resumes acquired from the musical information centers of several countries. During the writing process, which lasted for more than three years, they received additional information from many modern composers, including Leo Brouwer and Reginald Smith Brindle among others. In addition, several internationally renowned performing guitarists provided valuable information; these include Magnus Andersson (Sweden), Remi Boucher (Canada), Margarita Escarpa (Spain), Aleksander Frauchi (Russia) and David Tanenbaum (USA) among others.The authors' aim was to write a well-structured book with separate chapters for each instrument, such as the Renaissance and Baroque guitar, the Renaissance and Baroque lute, the vihuela, etc. This unique structure enables the reader to easily discover which composers wrote for a certain instrument during any given period. In addition to the composers one would expect to find in such a comprehensive listing, the book documents several historical and modern composers for whom little previous information has been available. The book's list of more than 400 guitar and lute concertos dating from the Baroque era to the present day is a totally unprecedented. Short introductions regarding guitar and lute-like instruments as well as their basic histories are provided at the beginning of the book. The authors hope that the Handbook of Guitar and Lute Composers will serve as a practical guide for both amateurs and professionals, encouraging further study of the history of these instruments and expanding the repertoire heard on today's concert stage.

ISBN 9781513459547. 8.75x11.75 inches.

This book of 53 intermediate-level guitar pieces is derived from Le Secret des Muses, a two-volume collection of lute tablature by Nicolas Vallet (c. 1583 c. 1642). Born in France, by 1614 Vallet had relocated to Amsterdam where he established a dance school and was active as a composer, lute teacher and leader of a consort that played at weddings and festivals. Le Secret des Muses is among the last published collections of French lute tablature intended for the 10-course Renaissance lute, which was ultimately supplanted by the larger 13-course Baroque model. Most of these pieces consist of traditional European dance forms, but also contains a few settings of popular lute themes and longer works suitable for concert performance are included. Written in standard notation only with occasional drop-D tuning, these pieces make excellent sight-reading and warmup material as well as historically significant concert selections.

There is plenty of music sheet for classical guitar of various styles, directions and levels of difficulty. There is also enough methodical literature for all tastes. However, every year there are appearing new schools, methodical collections and exercises. That?s why the art of playing classical guitar is not standing still.

During my pedagogical activity rather often I faced the problem of searching or creating small exercises for a particular technique and solution of a particular problem. What didn?t suit me in the existing studies? First of all, the monotony of technical material (the accent only on the left hand technique of a performer, while the concentration of sound control is mostly in the right hand; a limited quantity of technical methods: arpeggios, chords, passagework technique). Secondly, it?s an amount of musical material. As a rule, the main efforts were aimed to memorize the text, which distracted from the very purpose of etudes, the work on a certain type of technical difficulties.
That is how the collection «Unusual Studies» appeared.
What is their «singularity»?
The collection is conditionally divided into several sections in the order of increasing the complexity of material, and it concludes with three «Concert Studies». They are distinguished by a more developed emotional atmosphere and rather high level of complexity and size. These studies require a certain level of preparation and can diversify a performer?s concert program. Nevertheless, they are only an addition to the basic material, which is focused primarily on the elementary and intermediate levels of training.
When it comes to the ?singularity?, focus is shifted to the right hand, with the detailed fingering of the right hand. The fingers «p» and «a» are introduced more actively, paying attention to the alignment of their sound, attack power. It is necessary to strive for full equality of all fingers of the right hand, using fingers «p» and «a» not only when playing bass and melody, but also in arpeggio, passaggio technique (in the middle of an arpeggio or passaggio).
- learning to use touches in a high contrast while playing: staccato/legato. This, in my opinion, is extremely necessary to already assimilate at the initial stage of training.
- active use of the alternation in the musical material of open and closed strings. Control over the strength of the sound of open strings, timbre ratio.
- using the high positions of the guitar?s fingerboard with open strings without excessive physical effort .
- rather small size of studies. This allows to concentrate directly on the technical difficulties, rather than on memorizing.

I hope that this collection will help you to achieve the desired result faster and more effectively, will bring not only methodical benefit, but also aesthetic pleasure.

Études for Solo Guitar
The subject of creating an educational aid for guitar students of an intermediate level that will serve also as a similar aid for theory and composition students fascinates me and motivates my compositional thought for quite a while. The objective was to create miniature complete works for the guitar, as J. S. Bach did with his fifteen inventions, in the ?manner? of an Étude that deals with specific aspects of guitar techniques and musicianship in general.


These Études are gradually graded based on their difficulty and style. They cover all the positions of the guitar and explore known and some unfamiliar techniques for the contemporary guitarist.
I used a compositional language more familiar for the level of the intermediate guitarist but without sacrificing my original compositional voice so these pieces could be used as concert works by the advanced musicians as well. My intention is to educate students in a multilevel study environment and to be able to promote the music of our time. During my teaching years I found that students become better musicians when they have been taught to adapt certain performance difficulties and compositional techniques at an earlier level of their training.
Titles:

1 with false optimism

2 with moderate sadness

3 with just the two of you

4 with a touch of impatience

5 with a touch of grandeur

6 with a counterpoint attitude

7 with a touch of shame

8 with a touch of boredom

9 going and never coming back

10 with a peaceful anger

11 without the heavy ones

12 without hope

13 without sense of humor

14 with a masculine attitude

15 with two little bears in mind

16 without hesitation

17 with shameless vibrato

18 with a touch of distress

19 without fear of failure

20 with this and that

21 with a kind motion

22 with a rondo attitude

23 with suspense

24 with everything you may have

ISBN 9781610652841. Some of the best known Latin American rhythms are included in this collection carefully graded from beginner to intermediate level. For this book Mel Bay asked an expert on Latin American music, world celebrated guitarist-composer Alfonso Montes, to put together all his expertise to come up with real Latin sounding pieces keeping the technical demands within reach of beginner and intermediate players. Latinitas, besides being full of beautiful melodies and captivating rhythms, should act as an introduction for guitarist of all ages to this fascinating music. Standard notation only. New Latin American pieces for pedagogical purposesPicking studies in 7 keysNew solos in diverse Latin styles for concertsBegins study of Latin American folk and popular musical formsCarefully graded to move at a user friendly paceUnmatched in comprehensivenessIncludes access to online audio.

ISBN 9781609741563. The Guitar Lessons of Julio Sagreras are among the most universally used collections of guitar music and represent a milestone in guitar didactic literature. The original six lesson books, along with the book Advanced Technique, were an immediate success on their introduction and remain so today. This edition brings together under one cover Lesson Books Four, Five, and Six as well as Sagreras's Advanced Technique volume. The studies in each book are carefully fingered and graded. They are charming, melodious and extremely effective in the classroom. They are also an ideal introduction to classical guitar playing and also to Latin American guitar music. Some of the later studies are appropriate as concert repertoire. This text is in English and Spanish, with French and German translations in an appendix at the back of the book.