Jan. 13, 2020: "This Week in Fingerstyle!"
January 13, 2020
"www.randalsview.blog"
"The most exciting playlist on Spotify" reloaded again for a great Monday morning, and the first of the new decade! "This Week in Fingerstyle" curated by Daryl Shawn! Daryl does all the selecting of the tunes, I just make a few comments. Put your headphones on or AirPods in and disappear into these wonderful sounds as we check out what gems Daryl found for us this week on this last monday of the decade!
First up is a new original: "Quandary" by the incomparable Casper Esmann! Casper is an artist who makes the guitar sing whether he is doing a cover or one of his originals like "Quandary". I particular love the treble range in Casper's playing as he does something unique that just makes the guitar cry out and pull you in along with creating that involuntary smile I get whenever I hear Casper play! There is no quandary here though, this is indeed another great one Casper!
"Fallen Leaves" takes the very different talents of both Billy-Joe Clarke and Mathew Joseph and blends them perfectly into a beautiful musical dance! These are two talents that can fill any size stage and to put them together you would think the stage would literally explode, but instead we get a mellow, perfect, and seamless meld to the extent that you perceive just one new artist rather than two familiar ones. Wow! This may be the most perfect collaboration of the year!
"Sons de Carilhoes (Brasil)" by Jürg Kindle is masterful, as is all of Jürg Kindle's work but this one is just absolute fun at the same time. The title refers to a type of wagon pulled by bulls throughout the countryside of Brazil and the piece is as delightful as a carousel!
"Chim Chim Cher-ee" takes all of us back to childhood and the delightful world of Mary Poppins. Cim Frode's version though has a haunting slight sadness. A wonderful unique interpretation that had me going back to listen many times. Fascinating Cim!!!
"Arrival of the Birds" by James Bartholomew has just a slight resemblance to "Carol of the Bells" at times in a delightful way. The piece indeed rings like a bell throughout and flutters and dives giving us a beautiful musical aerial display. This piece is tremendously thought-provoking and cerebral in its short 3 minutes. Beautiful!
"How Can We Not" by Daryl Shawn is his latest and the first in what Daryl promises will be a prolific year for the usually sparse Daryl Shawn. Daryl is one of the few artists who play exclusively in standard tuning and with that "limitation" Daryl manages to take the guitar to a place where most artists can never get. I have previously described several of Daryl's pieces as utilising "minimalism" to accomplish something unique and this one falls into that territory as well. Lacking some of the fireworks that often accompany alternate tunings Daryl drills down into a simple tune and squeezes out every delicious drop! Absolute love Daryl's work and this piece and I am excited about what this year brings from his hands and his delicious guitar!
"Invitation - Guitar Version" by Chris Embers & Jakob Henriques is a tremendous nylon string guitar version of this piece that is haunting and beautiful. These two have created a masterpiece!
"Come Together - Instrumental Guitar" by Mark Kroos blows me away! The Beatles would be proud! 50 years old and Mark makes this as fresh and scintillating as the original! Well done!
"Caletonia" by Elson Complex is a spanish guitar influenced piece that is a blend between Andalusia and Catalonia but goes beyond the two into a third world that lives only in this artist's heart and fingers. Almost terrifyingly beautiful the artist manages to evoke a fascinatingly dark place with a sadness that doesn't really resolve. It's almost as if he is saying "hey, sometimes that's life, and you just hang on." This one brought tears to my eyes!
"Tranquility" by Jacob Luecke is a calming end to "This Week's" ten new choices. Sitting just a few feet from the peaceful Pacific Ocean waiting for the sun to rise, this is the perfect piece to accompany that wait in absolute tranquility! Thank you Jacob!
"Fallen Leaves" takes the very different talents of both Billy-Joe Clarke and Mathew Joseph and blends them perfectly into a beautiful musical dance! These are two talents that can fill any size stage and to put them together you would think the stage would literally explode, but instead we get a mellow, perfect, and seamless meld to the extent that you perceive just one new artist rather than two familiar ones. Wow! This may be the most perfect collaboration of the year!
"Sons de Carilhoes (Brasil)" by Jürg Kindle is masterful, as is all of Jürg Kindle's work but this one is just absolute fun at the same time. The title refers to a type of wagon pulled by bulls throughout the countryside of Brazil and the piece is as delightful as a carousel!
"Chim Chim Cher-ee" takes all of us back to childhood and the delightful world of Mary Poppins. Cim Frode's version though has a haunting slight sadness. A wonderful unique interpretation that had me going back to listen many times. Fascinating Cim!!!
"Arrival of the Birds" by James Bartholomew has just a slight resemblance to "Carol of the Bells" at times in a delightful way. The piece indeed rings like a bell throughout and flutters and dives giving us a beautiful musical aerial display. This piece is tremendously thought-provoking and cerebral in its short 3 minutes. Beautiful!
"How Can We Not" by Daryl Shawn is his latest and the first in what Daryl promises will be a prolific year for the usually sparse Daryl Shawn. Daryl is one of the few artists who play exclusively in standard tuning and with that "limitation" Daryl manages to take the guitar to a place where most artists can never get. I have previously described several of Daryl's pieces as utilising "minimalism" to accomplish something unique and this one falls into that territory as well. Lacking some of the fireworks that often accompany alternate tunings Daryl drills down into a simple tune and squeezes out every delicious drop! Absolute love Daryl's work and this piece and I am excited about what this year brings from his hands and his delicious guitar!
"Invitation - Guitar Version" by Chris Embers & Jakob Henriques is a tremendous nylon string guitar version of this piece that is haunting and beautiful. These two have created a masterpiece!
"Come Together - Instrumental Guitar" by Mark Kroos blows me away! The Beatles would be proud! 50 years old and Mark makes this as fresh and scintillating as the original! Well done!
"Caletonia" by Elson Complex is a spanish guitar influenced piece that is a blend between Andalusia and Catalonia but goes beyond the two into a third world that lives only in this artist's heart and fingers. Almost terrifyingly beautiful the artist manages to evoke a fascinatingly dark place with a sadness that doesn't really resolve. It's almost as if he is saying "hey, sometimes that's life, and you just hang on." This one brought tears to my eyes!
"Tranquility" by Jacob Luecke is a calming end to "This Week's" ten new choices. Sitting just a few feet from the peaceful Pacific Ocean waiting for the sun to rise, this is the perfect piece to accompany that wait in absolute tranquility! Thank you Jacob!
And that completes the new top ten for this week and this decade! You will now find all the past "This Week in Fingerstyle" music following this week's new ten so you can enjoy all that this wonderful playlist has brought to the world of fingerstyle! Enjoy!
Daryl Shawn, thank you again for making my Monday mornings a very special and exciting part of every week!
And that's it for another "This Week in Fingerstyle" by Daryl Shawn who every week puts together "the most exciting playlist on Spotify"!
Remember to "Follow/Heart/Like" the playlist that Daryl Shawn so painstakingly creates every week!
Join us every week for "This Week in Fingerstyle" on Spotify!
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