Guitarra de Cristal: Contemporary Cuban Music for the Guitar (review)

In his second CD recording, the Ecuadorian-born American guitarist Anton Machleder offers a collection of solo guitar music composed by some of the most important Cuban composers of the second half of the 20 ^thcentury. The recording includes well known works by Leo Brouwer, Joaquín Nin-Culmell, and Julián Orbón alongside more obscure compositions by Harold Gramatges and Aurelio de la Vega. It is interesting that Machleder chooses to incorporate composers from a wide variety of ideological and aesthetic tendencies. This includes composers who left Cuba before the 1959 revolution, composers who left Cuba because of the revolution, composers who stayed on the island and became major actors in the musical life of the new regime, and composers who have spent time both on the island and abroad.

From the neoclassical tone in Gramatges' Pequeña suiteand Nin-Culmell's Seis variaciones sobre un tema de Milánto the avant-garde experimentalism in Brouwer's Canticum, from the stylish references to Cuban folk music in Gramatges' Como el caudal de la fuenteand Orbón's Preludio y danzato the uncompromising modernism of de la Vega's Bifloreo, this fine selection of music gives the listener a good overview of the wide variety of musical aesthetics that informed Cuban conservatory composers from 1943 to 1992. The world premiere recordings of de la Vega's Bifloreoand Gramatges' Pequeña suitemake this a worthwhile CD from the outset.

As a guitarist, Machleder is a product of an important pedagogical tradition founded by N. American Aaron Shearer, a school that produced musicians of the caliber of Manuel Barrueco, Ricardo Cobo, David Tannenbaum, and David Starobin. Machleder's clean and secure technique fulfills the expectations we have from a member of such a tradition. In some of the most inspired moments in this recording, Machleder's technique is put to good advantage in the service of the music, resulting in moments of controlled refinement and careful attention to detail. This is especially true in Gramatges suite, Nin-Culmell's set of variations, Orbón's prelude, and some of Brouwer's Études simples.

However, Machleder's playing is sometimes marked by a sense of directionlessness (in terms of shaping larger musical gestures) as well as a lack of energy and excitement. This is evident in the second movement of Brouwer's Canticumand in de la Vega's Bifloreo,pieces of vibrant intensity that in Machleder's interpretations strike the listener as sequences of plain, seemingly unconnected episodes. Another minor issue is the guitarist's disruption of the musical flow due to awkward phrasing or abrupt tempo changes that sometimes seem to respond to technical difficulties (e.g., in Orbón's "Danza") or to conscious musical choices (Gramatges' "Como habanera" and "Como son" from Como el caudal de la fuente).

Regardless of these problems, Machleder should be commended for his decision to put together an album of significant works by major composers at a time when even the most prominent guitarists tend to shy away from such endeavors. As part of this project, the well-written and informative notes of Cindy Lee are particularly noteworthy since they add an attractive extra dimension to the overall product. The proliferation of mediocre guitar recordings featuring the most clichéd items of the repertory makes Machleder's serious contribution especially welcome. Both guitar and Latin American art music enthusiasts will find this recording an interesting addition to their music collection.