Cristiano Porqueddu
Les Productions D’Oz: 20 pages
Cristiano Porqueddu has written many works for the guitar over the years, and also recorded many CDs including box sets of some very interesting material on the Brilliant Classics label to name just one. Here is the second book of a set of 8 studies, (book one of which I reviewed last year) based on paintings of some extraordinary landscapes of XiaoXiang
Similar to the first book, these four pieces are very melodic and often full of oriental sounding moments including cross- string arpeggios, with a mixture of open strings and stopped ones but often including many arpeggiated figurations that I have never seen before. As a result his sound world is often completely new and uniquely styled.
The Temple in The Mountain is a Dm piece with the 6th string to D. beginning in 3 / 4 with a two – voiced idea it then moves into a Piu Mosso mostly in 4/4 but with the occasional 5/4 bar and an instruction to make the dynamic range very wide throughout. This section has some modern ideas mostly in 2 voices with the odd chord in between that usually has a harmonic crunch to it. After this the opening speed returns as a varied version of the opening. A rich climax is achieved and the piece closes on a downward set of arpeggios and an open 5th D chord.
The Fishing Villager in the Evening Glow is in the slightly unusual key of G#m (How many of those have you seen recently?) An Andante Calmo and again in two voices the piece moves around in a most unexpected fashion that means you have to be a good reader! After 22 bars it moves into Bm with a melodic two voiced idea, and then up a semi – tone into Cm which continues until a Un Poco Piu Sostenuto idea leads us back to the opening key and main theme, where the coda closes on the home key.
The Moon in the Autumn on Dongting Lake has a very wide ranging set of arpeggios that sound very oriental in their harmonies, after which the piece turns into an Allegretto before slowing down for a rhythmically complex two voiced idea . This changes into G#m again as an Adagio Sostenuto, before the Allegretto, and finally the opening arpeggios lead the piece into its coda.
The final piece The Sailing Ship Returning Home is a 5/4 piece with some imaginatively rhythmed passages where the parts cross over and under each other in a quite original way. There are many moments where runs of demi – semi – quavers dash around the fingerboard in all directions and a number of speed and time signature changes that are quite difficult to achieve .The piece’s coda is marked Piu Tranquillo and the rhythms are complex right to the end.
These are interesting works, very different from what you might have seen before, and providing you have a good technique, you may really enjoy giving them a try.
Chris Dumigan
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