Contemporary Music for Guitar = ILKKA TURTA: Etudes I-X; LEO BROUWER: El Decameron Negro; TOSHIO HOSOKAWA: Two Japanese Songs – Ilkka Turta, guitar – MSR Classics

by | Mar 6, 2014 | Classical CD Reviews

Contemporary Music for Guitar = ILKKA TURTA: Etudes I-X; LEO BROUWER: El Decameron Negro; TOSHIO HOSOKAWA: Two Japanese Songs – Ilkka Turta, guitar – MSR Classics MS 1491, 53:43 [Distr. by Albany] ***1/2:

The church in Finland where this was recorded tends to obscure the more incisive and lustrous sound of Mr. Turta’s guitar to the point of what sounds like a blanket being thrown over a loudspeaker. The treble simply doesn’t come through the way it should, and I don’t have any way of knowing whether the building itself is responsible or the engineers failing to properly capture the guitar—a church is an odd place to record the instrument. [Not if it has good acoustics, as Opus 3, 2L and others have proved…Ed.] Turta, himself a Finnish national and 27-year-old with a flaming technique, brings a vast amount of intelligence to this recital even though there are places where I was hoping for a little more passion. His own opus, the Etudes are quite ripe with lots of melodic snippets easily assimilated and remembered, with a good degree of concentrated tone painting deliberately based on imagery. For a thesis project this is really some exceptional writing, and it proves very enjoyable.

Brouwer’s name is a common one these days, known by music lovers everywhere, and ingrained in the minds and hearts of guitar aficionados the world over. His three-movement story, based on African folk tales collected by Leo Frobenius, are enthralling. The static utterings of the Two Japanese Songs by Toshio Hosokawa make for a surprisingly quiet and almost benign denouement to this effective, but short recital.

—Steven Ritter

Related Reviews
Logo Pure Pleasure
Logo Crystal Records Sidebar 300 ms
Logo Jazz Detective Deep Digs Animated 01