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Carlos Santana

El testament d’Amèlia is a popular Catalan folk song. Miquel Llobet (1878-1938) arranged beautifully the melody for guitar in his “Canciones Populares Catalanas”. Llobet, he was a guitar virtuoso that studied with Tarrega (1852-1909). He toured Europe and, it is said, that is one of Segovia’s main influences.

The lyrics tell a grim tale: Amèlia dies from a broken heart, having lost her unfaithful husband to her own mother. She decides to bequeath her husband to her mother,  «perquè el tingueu en cambra com fa molt temps que feu» (which basically means: “you can have him in your bedroom, as you have already been doing for a long time».

The piece is in D minor and, to play it, you will need to tune the low E to D.  Due to the sense of deep sorrow and despair present on the melody, the interpretation requires a slow tempo.

You can download the guitar score here.

The Frog Galliard is a composition by John Dowland (1563 – 1626). Dowland is one of the most admired English medieval composer. He was also a singer and lutenist. Recently, his instrumental music has undergone a major revival, and many of his pieces have been adapted from lute to guitar, and became part of the classical guitar repertoire. No long ago, in 2006, Sting released Songs from the Labyrinth, that features Dowland’s songs.

It has not been confirmed why John Dowland’s Frog Galliard has this curious title.This piece was very popular and well-known in its time.

There exist six known versions for lute of the Frogg Galliard, but only one carries Dowland’s autograph. It differs from the others primarily in the varied repeat of the first strain, which consists of virtuosic triplets over a trochaic bass line drawn from the first strain. The most unusual aspect of Dowland’s Frogg Galliard is its trochaic rhythm, which persists throughout the piece (as well as in “Now, O now”).

From: http://www.answers.com/topic/the-frog-galliard-for-lute-p-23

The piece is played by Scott Tennant, the author of the acclaimed series of instructional books: Pumping Nylon. These series are a fenomenal resource to improve your technique and overall sound.

One of the best pieces to start practicing arpeggios is “Romance Anónimo” (Anonymous Romance). It has been a highly controversial issue to establish who composed this piece. Narciso Yepes confessed in a radio interview that we composed the Romance when we was 7 years old. Although it is true that part of its popularity is owed to him, it is doubtful that he was the composer since it was known before he was born.It clearly influenced the initial arpeggio of Nothing Else Matters, by Metallica.

Leaving this controversy aside, the composition is part of the repertoire of many classical guitar players. Overall this is an easy piece for the right hand once the arpeggio pattern becomes familiar, however, some left-hand stretches require a certain opening up of the hand.

About the structure, it is quite simple. The composition is divided in three parts: starts in E minor, goes to E major and back to E minor as a restatement of the first section.

Curiously, the right hand plays an inverted arpeggio throughout the whole piece (a-m-i). This arpeggio form is the same as that of the Tárrega study in E minor. For this reason it is an ideal piece to practice arpeggios and work on your tone. My advise when practicing is to:

 -          Control the volume. First step is just try to make each note sound the same. On performance an effort should be made to bring out the melody, playing the second and third notes of each triplet group slightly softer than the first.

-          Practice with the metronome before trying to play rubato.

-          Put a little bit of emphasis on the bass note.

 You can download the tablature at http://www.classtab.org/zanroman.txt

Control and accuracy are above speed. Practice slow and then speed up trying not to lose accuracy and control.

We all do have limits. We are not all gonna be able to play as fast as Paco de Lucia. But that is alright, because he is Paco de Lucia, and we are us, and you are you.

Scott Tennant. Pumping Nylon: The Classical Guitarist’s Technique Handbook.