iTalent Round 4 - An Alm For The Love of God
This is my entry for the brand new edition of this awesome contest hosted by @ivan.atman! There are some changes which I really love, that I believe will benefit all the contestants, especially the musicians. So kudos to @ivan.atman for making these changes and welcome to the judges @megy.fine.arts, @antminer, @bil.prag and @olegw.
My entry is a piece by the great Paraguayan Guitarist and Composer, Agustin Barrios. It's a piece called Limosna por el amor de Dios" -"An alm for the love of God"- This piece uses a very complex technique called the Tremolo.
Tremolo
It's a technique that involves the thumb, which plays the bass, or the accompaniment, and the rest of the fingers, index, middle and ring plays the melody. There are so many books on this topic and it's a technique that has inspired many guitarist to learn the classical guitar. I for one fell in love with the Classical Guitar when I heard a piece played using tremolo, and I'm pretty sure there are many others like me. When executed well it gives the listener an illusion that there are 2 players playing simultaneously.
So basically you will need to use four fingers, but I do know of some guitarist who play the tremolo with just 3 fingers. So there is no real rule of thumb here (pun unitended :), as long as you can get the melody clear and well projected, which is the difficult part. That's because the thumb, being the strongest finger, can at times drown out the melody...that is assuming the thumb is playing the bass (there are some pieces where the thumb plays the melody). So finding a balance between melody and the accompaniment, is something that takes a lot of practice. I basically do a lot of slow practice, making sure that I can control my thumb. I also try my best to focus on the melody when I'm performing this piece. That can be difficult too, because the accompaniment, (where this particular piece is concerned at least), is also very beautiful and you tend to want to bring that out too.
The Conception
The story of the conception of this piece goes back to 1944. Barrios, while he was teaching his student he heard a knock on the door. When he opens it sees an old lady with her arm stretched out and he says to him “Una Limosna por el amor de Dios" -"An alm for the love of God" Barrios hands the lady a few coins and goes over to his student and says to him “I am working on a new piece and I know what I will do with it. I will incorporate the knocking at the door in the piece” Barrios died on August 7th 1944 and left the piece finished but without a title. When the student that was with him told this story, the piece was called "Una limosna por el amor de Dios"... for being Mangore's last composition, it is often called "El Ultimo Canto" -The last song-.
The bass part or the accompaniment, played by the thumb is supposed to imitate the sound of the knocking of the door, which is heard in the beginning and carried on throughout the whole piece.
I really hope you enjoy this piece and all the best to all the contestants of this contest. This is the 4th time I'm taking part and I really love this contest and the variety it has!
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This is amazing @grayarty from technique description to the story behind the Barrios composition, I myself am playing tremolo with three and four fingers, depending on the power I require in the tremolo, with three I can amplify the tremolo section up to 5 times, three fingers are also used in the banjo playing techniques for the same reason, people often told me I play banjo tremolo on the guitar :)
Thanks a lot @ivan.atman! Geez I didn't know that you played the classical guitar..wow you really are a man of many talents! I'm sooooo jealous lol! Yeah doing the tremolo with 3 fingers does amplify the tremolo, but with a piece this long it can get rather tiring..you would need a lot of stamina to get it all the way through..
@grayarty My fingers got so strong when I played the acoustic, I could do the tremolo for hours :), now I'm playing and recording mostly with the electric.
wow that's so cool! Would love to hear the music!
I didn't record back then, just improvised a lot with the acoustic guitar on the loop pedal, used it as a drum and a bass as well to mix everything up
wow niceee!!
@grayarty I have some demo songs online, but none of them are classical :)
https://sensei-archers.bandcamp.com/album/demo-loop-2016-2017
That's great! Will check it out! I listen to all kinds of music..I'm not such a "classical music purist" kinda person lol
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