What Next?

The final chapter poses questions to readers who have successfully navigated material in the book in the interests of determining the steps best suited for their long-term artistic development: Do I have the foundational background to study successfully my next repertoire piece? Do I have the experience to make artistic and nuanced decisions, or will my ear be compromised by a struggling, exercise-like reading of a work? Am I only drawn to the type of music that comes easily to me, or am I willing to strike out in new directions? The answers may highlight differences between unexamined received wisdom and critical thinking. It is in these differences that a student’s development as an artist can begin to take flight.

Melody and Accompaniment

This chapter presents material to help students explore playing melody in chordal textures, above an Alberti bass, in an arpeggiated texture, and in single-line playing laced with occasional chords. The uninitiated often view the guitar as a chordal instrument, but technical and interpretive mastery requires the ability to voice any note in any texture at will. Refined and artistic voicing is often difficult for guitarists because the articulation of different parts of a musical texture are divided among the fingers of one hand instead of between two hands, as is often the case on the piano. Karl Leimer acknowledged this difficulty for pianists in 1932, and it holds true for guitarists. The problem is one of right-hand finger independence. Of special interest is the presentation of historical right-hand fingering practices for Alberti bass textures, which are different from those found in modern method books or assumed by modern players.

Harmony

This chapter explores the harmonic resources of the instrument and builds upon the fingerboard harmony material in chapter 1. Playing homophonic textures on the guitar creates problems of smoothness and connection. Fernando Sor recognized this and provided rests between chords in his Op. 35, No. 11 and Op. 31, No. 20. Two arpeggio pieces of special harmonic interest are also included. This chapter challenges the widely accepted instruction that recommends the placing of all the left-hand fingers that are to form a chord at the same time, whether or not the notes of the chord are arpeggiated or struck simultaneously. This advice, repeated in almost every guitar method since the early 19th century, accounts for one of the reasons guitarists have difficulty performing convincing legato phrasing. The chapter presents alternative advice, the reasons behind it, and exercises to help develop this technical and artistic refinement.

Slurs

Explanations of slur technique, known also as ligado, in guitar methods tend to be limited. This chapter looks at what Matteo Carcassi and Ferdinando Carulli called “vibration” or “´écho” slurs, which allow players to keep slurs aligned with strong and weak beats. Other composers, such as Felix Horetsky and Mauro Giuliani, indicated slurs that occur across beats as left-hand fingers slur all notes on a string within a position, regardless of the metric divisions. Music in this chapter explores both of these idiomatic techniques. The chapter concludes with an in-depth look at advanced slur technique by examining the relationship between where the left-hand fingertip contacts the string and the path the left-hand finger must take after the slur. Included are original diagrams and original exercises.

Repeated Notes

Repeated notes are used frequently in compositions for the guitar as a way to provide the illusion of greater sustain or as a technique to add brilliance. Modern guitarists usually think of tremolo technique when they think of repeated notes, but tremolo technique is relatively recent. This chapter documents the practices used by early lutenists and 19th-century guitarists to play repeated notes and it provides material for studying the various ways these musicians developed their techniques. The discussion of Fernando Sor’s use of the right-hand thumb and index finger for repeated notes will be of interest to today’s guitarists. This chapter also explores the ways in which 19th-century guitarists played passages that modern guitarists might assume to be examples of modern tremolo technique. The fingering practices in this chapter are not covered in standard modern method books.

Scale Exercises and Studies

This section will improve students’ understanding of scale technique by exploring the fingering practices of major 19th-century guitarists—Carulli, Carcassi, Sor, Aguado, Coste, Mertz—including how these practices evolved and their significance when performing music by these composers. Then follow a series of scale pieces in the lower positions suitable for students in their first years of study, followed by scale studies in the upper positions suitable for more advanced students. Pieces from the literature for lute are included to provide music containing scales that is accessible to those starting out. This is followed by advanced upper-position material. The section ends with an exploration of how to develop advanced right-hand fingering practices through the use of three-finger patterns to aid the develop of speed and to solve the problems of fingering nonidiomatic music, such as the more difficult works of J. S. Bach.

Learning the Fingerboard

“Learning the Fingerboard” presents the means for students to understand the logic of the guitar fingerboard and master its grammar so they will be able to understand more easily and quickly the musical language used by composers. Unlike the piano, which has one location for each note, guitarists can play the same scale, chord, or cadence, in multiple locations. The Segovia scales, however—which are widely used for foundational work—don’t cover large areas of the guitar fingerboard. This section begins with the study of open-position major and minor scales and their associated cadences, major and minor moveable scale forms and related chords, and major and minor long scales, which traverse the length of the fingerboard. Harmony is studied through the working out of triads on each of the four sets of three adjacent strings. The section ends with the first modern edition of cadences in commonly used positions for each key by Franz Bathioli.

Arpeggios

This chapter offers material for arpeggio study suitable for beginners through advanced players. Arpeggio textures are one of the most commonly used textures in music for the classical guitar, and the number of arpeggio études in the literature reflects this. Material begins with simple right-hand arpeggio patterns that make use of sympathetic movement of the fingers between thumb strokes (that is, the right-hand fingers flex together or in sequence, and no finger moves in the opposite direction during the arpeggio pattern) and continues through increasingly complex patterns involving opposed motion among the fingers (that is, right-hand fingers are used more than once in a pattern between thumb strokes), sometimes in combination with an independent voice played by the thumb. The cultivated study of sympathetic and opposed motion will help guitarists design more fluid and coordinated finger movements to enhance their arpeggio technique.

Florid or Virtuoso Études

Most of the music in The Classical Guitar Companion makes use of the same technique or musical texture throughout. High-level virtuoso playing requires that guitarists become adept at navigating ever-changing musical textures and the techniques required to produce them. Florid or virtuoso études present the challenges of combining and switching between various technical elements, such as arpeggios, scales, slurs, and shifts, at rapid tempi. Of special interest is the brief discussion of “latency” at high speeds, which is applicable to these studies, and how virtuoso players transcend the limits of the central nervous system when initiating a movement or series of movements that must occur in less time than it takes for the signal to move to get from the brain to the hands (100 milliseconds).

Counterpoint

The technique required to perform counterpoint convincingly on the guitar is not idiomatic to the instrument. Left-hand fingers must be able to sustain one note while other fingers move to form other notes. In order to take advantage of the instrument’s contrapuntal capabilities, guitarists need to design meticulous fingerings that are connected to musical intent for both hands. This chapter first looks at two-voice pieces by Enriquez de Valderrabano, Mauro Giuliani, Marco Aurelio Zani de Ferranti, and Dionisio Aguado and then proceeds to explore pieces by Fernando Sor that make use of freistimmigkeit textures. The chapter concludes with a recercar by Giovanni Maria da Crema and four fantasias by Francesco da Milano, the latter being some of the finest sixteenth-century lute music. Music in this chapter requires increasingly developed left-hand finger independence.