Week 1: Setting Sails! 
Welcome to the Main Thread for the first week of the "Music YOU Love" practice challenge!
↓ Happy Sharing! ↓
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Ok let's open the challenge with a piece of Roque Carbajo I recorded a few months ago, a French Canadian composer that lives not that far from me. Here's «Fleur de Lotus» from «12 Miniatures».
I quickly wanted to test out Augustine Regal strings...
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Blaise Laflamme Gorgeous! Beautiful piece played very nicely. The strings are sounding great, too! How do you like them? What tension are they?
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Steve Pederson The Augustine Regal are high tension strings and they indeed sound great on this guitar and for this piece. However I feel they're not enough detailed for my taste, while they provide great warmth and roundness, they're not that good at multi-layer timbres and nail angles.
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Blaise Laflamme Wonderful performance and such a lovely piece. Really enjoyed it. Your timbre is very crisp and great use of tone color. How do you like the Augustine Regal strings? They are sounding good.
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Dale Needles Thanks Dale. Yeah they are sounding great but they are not enough detailed for what I'm looking for, but for this piece it's a good match. I actually have restrung with a set Knobloch CX over the weekend in preparation for Evocation
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Blaise Laflamme Don't know Knobloch CX strings. Definitely looking forward to hearing them in your performance of Evocacion.
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Dale Needles CX is their carbon variant for trebles, they have QZ Nylon which is a nylon variant that sounds more clear than most other brands and one I have to test more is their Erithacus series combined with a Bio-Nylon variant for trebles, I really like what I tried first but the tension I got was too low. Yeah I think they'll have a great match for Carlevaro's music!
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Blaise Laflamme Just ordered a set. Look forward to checking them out.
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Dale Needles Cool!
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After rummaging around in a few places, I have decided that the main piece I want to work on for this challenge is Elegy for a King by Frederic Hand. He is an American guitar composer, and he wrote this piece in 1971 as a tribute to the great American civil rights leader, Martin Luther King Jr., who was assassinated in 1968. It's a pretty challenging piece, so I hope my hands are up to the task.
Because of my nature, I will also periodically try to post some smaller pieces from around the world during the challenge. To start it off, here is a video I made of the only other piece I have played by Frederic Hand. It is called Desert Sketch, and it is one of a series of pieces he wrote that was inspired by a trip to the desert of southern Utah (one of the western U.S. states). When I made it, I opted to use some desert images in the video rather than show myself playing. As such, I am certain you will find it more visually pleasing than my other videos. It does, however, have my "dry" sense of humor.
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Eric Phillips Beautiful Eric, you created such an atmosphere and the tone is right. Great choice Elegy for a King, that's a beautiful work. I never had the chance to learn and play it, a few friends did, I'm looking forward for your version!
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Eric Phillips Wow! Eric, that was beautiful ... and quite a surprise. A bit of a change from Sor. Your tone and phrasing were wonderful. I had never heard this, though I have heard some of Frederick Hand's music. Thanks for posting this beautiful piece.
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Jack Stewart Thanks so much, Jack! Yes, it’s a far cry from Sor. After playing it, my guitar looked up at me and said, “We’re not in Kansas anymore.”
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Eric Phillips Did you name your guitar Toto?
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Jack Stewart
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Eric Phillips Very nice change of pace. Loved the accompanying video of the Southwest. Very beautiful and paired nicely with the music.
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Eric Phillips I loved the piece and also your playing . Very poetic. Thank you for sharing
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Eric Phillips Well done Eric, very expressive and well played. I to did some hiking in Moab, UT
and feel Frederic captured a lot of the stark pristine wilderness of that area in those notes.
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Michael Shirk Thanks, Michael. In his notes on the piece, Hand said that he tried to capture the way the desert would seem to change so quickly depending on the weather and time of day, hence the quick mood changes in the music.
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Eric Phillips it is, as always a pleasure to listen to you and the pict
ures are wonderful.
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Eric Phillips Thanks for the journey to the desert! The atmosphere you created took me back to many trips I’ve enjoyed there! Well done!
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Eric Phillips Ha! "Dry sense of humor"! I didn't get that at first, I will admit. But indeed, a beautiful piece!
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Eric Phillips Such a timbre, Eric! A great pallet of colors and desert images is a great idea! You can inscribe this video in a short movie festival!
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Hand - Elegy for a King measures 1-20 (Mar 6)
Here is my first attempt at this piece. I am playing the A section in D minor. (After this, there is a B section in D major, and then it returns to an altered A section in D minor, with a short coda).
The part I struggle with the most by far is the last bit, from measures 13-20 (see the picture below). It has these rather large stretches together with full barres that I find nearly impossible (especially measure 16, which is the first measure of the second system in the picture). I also don't feel comfortable with the giant "arpeggio grace notes" in measures 17-18.
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Eric Phillips Very nice , Eric. I have not heard this before, though I am aware of it. You have a great start on it. I thought playing the 'e' as open and the 'f' on the second string (m. 16) might be easier - until I actually tried it. So... never mind.
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Jack Stewart Thanks, Jack. I thought of that too. It's still pretty hard to play that way, though, and I think it makes the melody line less clear. I actually think it sounds pretty good just to leave the high F out of it, as it is not the melody note, but Frederic Hand might disagree. The verdict is still out as far as I'm concerned, though.
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End of the Year Challenge: Finish Strong!
