Corfu International   Guitar Congress  21 - 27 August 2003

A short ferry trip from the Greek mainland, the island of Corfu is a  favourite holiday destination for my fellow Brits. For this reason alone, I  have so far made every effort to resist its charms. But there I was at the check-in desk, amid a human collage of shiny football shirts and sandals worn with socks, responding to a generous invitation from Apostolos  Paraskevas and Leonidas Kanaris, directors of the CIGC. Now in its seventh incarnation, the CIGC has evolved from an event first held in the city of Volos. Despite its present 'fun and sun' location, the content is of considerable substance, with several first performances and an international composition prize that attracts more applicants than the performers' competition. Both directors are themselves active providers of new repertoire. Paraskevas, who is currently based in the USA, recently performed his third and fourth guitar concertos under the baton of Lukas Foss at the Carnegie Hall. Kanaris, a resident of Athens, is an outstanding purveyor of sophisticated contemporary miniatures, his twelve Lyric Pieces for solo guitar being among the most inspired modern middleweights ever to come my way (CG January 1997 p.38).

At the northernmost tip of the crescent-shaped bay that dominates the island's principal town stands the Old Fortress. Positioned on a naturally elevated site that has been used for coastal defence since the Byzantine era, the current structure dates back mostly to the periods of Venetian and British rule. It was here that all the CIGC performances took place, a modern air-conditioned hall being carefully concealed beneath the main courtyard. After the opening participants' concert of mainly Greek music, including two charming flute and guitar pieces by Leonidas Kanaris, the first of three American guests arrived on stage to an enthusiastic welcome.
Best known in the UK for his Naxos recordings of Sor, Ponce and Lauro, Adam Holzman is a live performer of poise, elegance and understated dynamism. Particularly memorable were the intricate guitar textures of Three Greek Letters by Sergio Assad, a work which has yet to enjoy the international recognition of the revered Brazilian's deservedly celebrated Aquarelle.

Like all evening performances at the CIGC, the above proceedings were scheduled for the highly civilised hour of 9.00pm, the first artist arriving on stage after 9.30 and Holzman's set starting around the time British pubs are calling for last orders. This leisurely approach is clearly the way things are done in these parts, my sandwiches from room service having still not materialised when I left the island five days after placing the order.

The daytime agenda of lectures and classes was equally relaxed, with nothing planned before 10.15am and few visiting pedagogues actually on their hind legs before quarter to eleven. This said, the didactic aspect of the CIGC made for impressive viewing, with masterclasses from all the visiting performers and a wide range of lectures from such high-ranking guests as Joseph Urshalmi, Theodore Antoniou and Vangelis Fampas. A minor problem was that of language. Translators were available, but only in limited supply. The result was that some indigenous orators delivered their wisdom in the mother tongue only, while at least one overseas visitor gave a worthy English-only presentation to an audience of attentive but not entirely comprehending Greek students.

The composition prize is a major feature of the CIGC, this year's entry occupying two concert-length sittings. The format was innovative and largely successful, with each work performed live by selected festival participants.

Given the limited preparation time, it was inevitable that some performances would be more assured than others and that this slightly uneven playing field would deliver a potential advantage to entries performed by their creators. This certainly seemed to be the case with Bolero para un Angel, composed and engagingly presented by the enigmatic figure of M. Opazo. An imaginative slice of late-night jazz in a more contemporary vein than its title might suggest, Opazo's offering appeared to have taken pole position when one adjudicator was heard to say it was the type of piece he would willingly perform himself. It's therefore with some bewilderment that I announce the victory of Couleurs 6 by the Belgian Jean-Yves Colmant, an honest but unarresting chromatic fragment that passed me by unnoticed first time around and made little further impression when it was heard again three days later. Perhaps I'll go down in history as the CG hack who blew his chance to report with gusto the birth of a 21st century guitar classic, but I'll take the risk.

A guitarist whose support of the contemporary repertoire remains second to none is David Tanenbaum. Celebrating the career of the recently departed Lou Harrison (1917-2003), Tanenbaum contrasted the charming Serenade from 1952 with the three-movement Scenes from Nek Chand, completed in the last year of the composer's life. As on previous occasions, Tanenbaum proved to be the consummate ambassador. The latter work offered an unexpected feast for the eye, the choice of hardware being a splendid chrome-encrusted National steel guitar, fretted for just intonation. No such visual distractions were allowed to interfere with the serious business of the first sonata from Royal Winter Music, although the spoken introduction with musical examples did much to identify the far from obvious connections between sound and source. Tanenbaum hasn't converted me to the RWM cause yet, but his efforts were by no means in vain.

With more new ground still to cover, the midweek interlude of Mediterranean songs from Klaudia Delmer was a strategically-placed diversion. Accompanied by the guitars of Vangelis Fampas and Rolland Hoffman, plus the agreeably extrovert percussionist Solis Barkis, Delmer emerged as an able vocalist with charisma by the cartload. Persistent tuning problems and the eventual failure of a faltering PA system denied the evening an entirely smooth passage, although the all-acoustic final set proved more fruitful than might have been feared.

My own stint of jury service for the performers' competition was marked by a refreshingly brief adjudicators' conference, in which unanimity was reached with ease. Despite two strong contenders, it was decided that no first prize should be awarded this time, but that Tal Horovitz from Israel was a worthy second. Third prize went to Hanny Heshmat and a commendation to
Kostas Tsardounis.

The brevity of the competition allowed ample time for a late evening showcase featuring some outstanding Greek guitarists, a compelling Brouwer Sonata from Dimitris Dimakopoulos and the cool Latin jazz of Aris Lanardis and Michalis Brouzos leading to an explosive Bellinati Jongo from George Behlivanoglou. It's programmes such as this, which open a window on the host nation's domestic guitar scene, that make the economy-class airborne trek worth enduring.

One of the many demands of festival promotion is that it often falls to the organisers to present their own wares as part of the finale. So it was that Apostolos Paraskevas, arrived on stage to a hero's welcome. In a solo set comprising his own Escape and tell my wife I love her, plus  Meta by Anthony De Ritis (all European premieres), Paraskevas soon established himself as a subtle and persuasive performer, whose compositions are clearly the work of a musician who takes that side of his work equally seriously.

The music of Michael Chapdelaine had made a cameo appearance in Adam Holzman's encore, but nothing could have prepared us for the arrival of the man himself. A time-served classical guitarist who, in his own words, 'used to have a tuxedo', Chapdelaine has now reinvented himself as a ponytailed fingerstyle rocker, who performs on a metal-strung acoustic hooked up to powerful amplification while grooving around the stage to the beat of his own potent compositions. It's well-known that, when classical guitarists attempt to cross the divide, the bridge usually breaks halfway, assuming they even get that far. But Michael Chapdelaine has built his own bridge on his own terms and has grown from being a highly competent classical guitarist (as demonstrated on a superb retrospective CD titled The DBX Reels) into one of the most dynamic and free-thinking live performers you'll see anywhere on any instrument. Most astonishing of all was his wild reworking of Saudade No.3, in which an all-new central quasi-improvisation travelled from Stephen Foster to the Drifters (twice) and to Mungo Jerry(!)

So ended an international gathering in which Greece's burgeoning guitar culture joined forces with some of America's finest. My warmest thanks to the all concerned, and will the next person checking into Room 421 pleasecancel the sandwiches.