Duets For Two Acoustic Guitars-The Christmas season has always been special to me. It is a season that has crystallized the hopes aspirations and faith of millions of people through the centuries. The amount of music written for Christmas is monumental.This book contains 14 scores from my Christmas Guitar Portraits recording. I selected various genres dear to me.First there are selections from the early American sacred song tradition. The Babe of Bethlehem Cherry Tree Carol A Star in the East The Shepherd's Star A Virgin Unspotted and I Wonder As I Wander all are from this rich heritage.I also picked a number of carols from theOld English genre. Away In The Manger Green Grow'th the Holly and What Child is This are included.Then there are the Christmas favourites. In the Bleak Mid-winter and a medley ofBaloo Lammy; The First Noel and Silent Night make any Christmas complete. Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence is one of my favourite Advent hymns. Gaudete Christus est natus is arousing carol dating back many centuries.Finally I included two originals. Lullay My Liking is an ancient carol text. Many composers over the centuries have written melodies to these lyrics most notably GustavHolst. I could not resist the temptation so the melody here is original. Finally Christmas Prayer is a new composition. I have always wanted to compose and arrange music designed to bring the Plectrum or Flatpick Guitarto the concert stage. These arrangements were written with that in mind.

Par BARTOK BELA. Béla Bartók’s “For Children” is one of the best known pedagogical works for piano teachers of the twentieth century, second only perhaps to the same composer’s “Mikrokosmos”. It was based firmly on the huge number of folk songs he collected, recorded and studied with his colleague Zoltán Kodály. At the time, Bartók was offering something very new to piano teachers and their students. Siegfried Steinkogler became acquainted with “For Children” at the beginning of his guitar studies and, from them, learnt a great deal about melody and harmonisation. He has chosen 38 of the original 79 pieces to offer in arrangements for the guitar. They are presented with helpful fingerings, technical solutions and aids to familiarize the younger students with common notations. For beginners, ten of the pieces are played exclusively in the first position before a gently increasing level of difficulty helps the player broaden their skills. In these arrangements, Bartók’s ingenious teaching pieces will be as invaluable to guitarists as they have been to your pianists for over one hundred years./ Répertoire / 2 Guitares