Posts Tagged ‘scott morris’
For the past few months GSI has been tracking down the best French guitars we could get our hands on to help Scott Morris record his new CD of Satie arrangements called ‘Phonology’. In the end we found guitars by Daniel Friederich, Dominique Field, Jean-Noel Rohe, Bertrand Ligier and finally a fantastic 1956 Bouchet which Scott used to record Nocturne 3 (in the first video) and which Andrew York, Scott’s features guest on the CD, then played on a duet of the ‘Sonatine Bureaucratique’, while Scott played a 1971 Friederich (the second Friederich to appear on the CD).
The CD should be out in a few months, and Scott will also be publishing his arrangements.
Both videos here feature audio recorded and mixed by Erich Gobel – not the final mixes for the CD, but they should give you an idea. Erich also shot the video of Scott playing Nocturne 3 on that 1956 Bouchet – and yes, they’re poking some fun at pretentious cinematography, so don’t freak out.
Scott Morris is recording a CD of his arrangements of Satie, so in keeping with the French theme we’ve decided to help get him some of the best French guitars around to record with. We started by lending him an amazing 2002 Daniel Friederich cedar guitar, and Scott was nice enough to shoot this video of himself playing his arrangement of Satie’s Nocturne No.1. Scott and the guitar sounded great, and we look forward to hearing more from him and finding more great French guitars for him to play.
Here’s another lesson from Scott Morris – this one on the use of Baroque ornamentation, which can be a somewhat controversial subject. Scott looks at the use of trills and mordents, how to go about applying them and even gets into their technique. This video is an accompaniment to chapter 4 of his book Classical Guitar Complete: From Basics to Bach. Scott is playing a 2012 Sebastian Stenzel guitar.
Here’s another lesson from Scott Morris from his book Classical Guitar Complete: From Basics to Bach, Vol. 2, this time on phrasing and musicality. Scott uses a Paganini sonata to illustrate how to go about making the choices about phrasing that make a piece of music come to life. Scott is playing a 1997 Alfredo Velazquez.
Here’s Scott Morris with another video companion lesson to his method Classical Guitar Complete- From Basics To Bach. In this lesson Scott uses the third movement from Satie’s Peccadilles Importunes to look at articulation – legato and staccato. He looks at both how to use these techniques and how to practice and perfect them as well. Scott is playing a 2001 Greg Smallman (not the 2003 Smallman that we currently have in stock and that belonged to Ben Verdery, but another one we had a few weeks ago).
Here’s another video lesson from Scott Morris, author of ‘Classical Guitar Complete – From Basics to Bach‘. This lesson deals with left hand shifting, and Scott uses the Schottish-Choro from the ‘Suite Popular Brasileira’ by Villa-Lobos as his example of how to deal with some tricky shifting. Scott’s playing a new guitar from Henner Hagenlocher.
Here’s another lesson by Scott Morris from his book ‘Classical Guitar Complete – From Basics to Bach‘. Today’s lesson is on string crossings and ‘choreographing’ your right hand in order to avoid bad crossings. Scott is playing a 2008 Paco Santiago Marin ’30th Anniversary’ model.
I just came across a nice article in the CSU Dominguez Hills newsletter about the session we did a few weeks back with Scott Morris and his students. Turns out that coming in to record some pieces with us was a slightly bigger deal for the undergrads than I had thought -and I still think they did a really great job. Check out the article here. We might have to do this more often…
Scott Morris has added a CD of audio examples to his book ‘Classical Guitar Complete – From Basics To Bach‘ and the book will now ship with the CD. Scott’s book has been really well received, and he’s feverishly working (according to him) on Volume II, which we hope will be out later this year.
As many of you already know, Scott Morris is the director of the Cal State Dominguez Hills guitar program. His program is growing so fast that he recently hired Matt Grief (of LAGQ fame) to help him out. Scott and I had been talking about how it might be fun to have some of his students come in and do some videos, so this week he came in with four of his students – one sophomore, two juniors and a senior – to try out some of their repertoire on some of our guitars. I was impressed not only with their playing, but with how quickly they took to playing for a camera, and I think everyone, including the demanding Dr. Morris, was pretty happy with the results.
