Guitar - Intermediate - Digital Download SKU: ZY.DO-1522 Composed by Francis Bebey. Arranged by Ingrid Riollot. Score. 5 pages. Les Editions Doberman-Yppan (digital) #DO 1522. Published by Les Editions Doberman-Yppan (digital) (ZY.DO-1522). Francis Bebey est né à Douala en juillet 1929, dans une grande famille où son père, pasteur, luttait pour nourrir ses enfants. Mais Francis a eu l'opportunité d'aller à l'école. Admirant son frère aîné, Marcel Eyidi Bebey, il s'est éduqué, s'est distingué, et a finalement reçu une bourse pour passer son baccalauréat en France.Nous approchions de la fin des années 1950 lorsqu'il est arrivé à La Rochelle. Plus que jamais, dans cette France où les Africains étaient regardés avec curiosité, condescendance ou dédain, Francis s'appuyait sur ses ressources intellectuelles. Travailleur assidu, il a obtenu son baccalauréat, puis s'est installé à Paris où il a commencé des études d'anglais à la Sorbonne. Un jour, il a su ce qui l'attirait vraiment : il voulait faire de la radio. Francis a appris son métier en France et aux Ã?tats-Unis.Après avoir travaillé quelques années comme reporter, il a été embauché en 1961 en tant que fonctionnaire international au Département de l'information de l'UNESCO.Parallèlement, Francis a toujours été attiré par la création musicale. Son activité diurne très sérieuse ne l'empêchait pas de fréquenter les clubs de jazz le soir. Ã? Paris, le jazz, la musique à la mode à cette époque, mais aussi la rumba et la salsa l'attiraient. Il collectionnait les disques et assistait à de nombreux concerts. Avec son complice Manu Dibango, Francis montait sur scène et jouait de la musique.Francis aimait la musique classique depuis son enfance. Il avait grandi en écoutant les cantates et les oratorios de Bach ou Handel que son père chantait au temple. Il s'est passionné pour la guitare, impressionné par les maîtres espagnols et sud-américains, et a décidé d'apprendre à jouer de l'instrument lui-même.Il a commencé à composer des pièces pour guitare, mêlant les diverses influences qui le traversaient avec la musique traditionnelle africaine qu'il portait en lui depuis son enfance. Son approche a captivé le directeur du Centre culturel américain (alors situé dans le quartier de Saint-Germain à Paris), qui lui a offert l'opportunité de se produire devant un public. Francis y a donné son premier récital de guitare (1963) devant un public hypnotisé. Son premier album solo est sorti peu de temps après.Progressivement, Francis est devenu reconnu comme musicien et compositeur. Plusieurs albums de l'ambassadeur africain de la guitare, comme le décrivait la presse, sont sortis. Il a également écrit des livres, au point que sa carrière artistique est devenue difficile à concilier avec sa carrière de fonctionnaire. En 1974, même s'il était devenu le directeur général chargé de la musique à l'UNESCO, il a fait le saut audacieux et a démissionné de cette prestigieuse institution pour se consacrer aux trois activités qui l'intéressaient : la musique, la littérature et le journalisme.Il a exploré le patrimoine musical traditionnel du continent africain, notamment à travers le piano à pouce sanza et la musique polyphonique des pygmées d'Afrique centrale, ou en chantant dans sa langue maternelle et en composant des chansons humoristiques en français !Le succès a suivi. Francis Bebey a parcouru le monde : de la France au Brésil, du Cameroun à la Suède, de l'Allemagne aux Caraïbes, ou du Maroc au Japon... la liste des pays où il a été invité à se produire, à donner des conférences ou à rencontrer des lecteurs est très longue. En plus de la reconnaissance publique, il bénéficiait de la reconnaissance de ses collègues musiciens, tels que le guitariste John Williams ou le Vénézuélien Antonio Lauro, qui l'ont invité à faire partie du jury d'un concours de guitare classique à Caracas.Sa vie était le voyage d'un pionnier africain, un homme enraciné dans son patrimoine culturel et portant un message de partage et d'espoir pour le monde. Son originalité continue de résonner dans le monde entier depuis son décès à la fin du mois de mai 2001.Francis Bebey was born in Douala in July 1929, into a large family where his father, a pastor, struggled to feed his children. But Francis had the opportunity to go to school. Admiring his elder brother, Marcel Eyidi Bebey, he educated himself, distinguished himself, and eventually received a scholarship to go and take his baccalaureate in France.We approached the end of the 1950s when he arrived in La Rochelle. More than ever, in this France where Africans were looked at with curiosity, condescension, or disdain, Francis relied on his intellectual resources. A diligent worker, he obtained his Baccalaureate, then moved to Paris where he started English studies at the Sorbonne. One day, he knew what truly attracted him: he wanted to do radio. Francis learned his craft in France and in the USA.After working for a few years as a reporter, he was hired in 1961 as an international civil servant in the UNESCO Information Department.In parallel, Francis had always been drawn to musical creation. His very serious daytime activity didnâ??t prevent him from frequenting jazz clubs in the evenings. In Paris, the Jazz, the trendy music of that time, but also rumba and salsa attracted him. He collected records and attended numerous concerts. With his accomplice Manu Dibango, Francis took the stage and played music.Francis liked classical music since his childhood. He grew up listening to the cantatas and oratorios of Bach or Handel that his father had sung in the temple. He became passionate about the guitar, impressed by the Spanish and South American masters, and decided to learn to strum the instrument himself.He started composing guitar pieces, blending the various influences that flow through him with the traditional African music he had carried within since childhood. His approach captivated the director of the American Cultural Center (then located in the Saint-Germain neighborhood of Paris), who offered him the opportunity to perform in front of an audience. Francis gave his first guitar recital there (1963) in front of a mesmerized audience. His first solo album was released shortly thereafter.Gradually, Francis became recognized as a musician and composer. Several albums of the African guitar ambassador, as described by the press, were released. He also wrote books, to the point that his artistic career became challenging to reconcile with his career as a civil servant. In 1974, even though he had become the General Manager in charge of music at UNESCO, he took the bold leap and resigned from this prestigious institution to dedicated himself to the three activities that interested him: music, literature, and journalism. He explored the traditional musical heritage of the African continent, notably through the thumb piano sanza, and the polyphonic music of the Central African pygmies, or singing in his native language and composing humoristic songs in French!Success followed. Francis Bebey traveled the world: from France to Brazil, Cameroon to Sweden, Germany to the Carribean, or Morocco to Japan... the list of countries where he was invited to perform, gives lectures, or meets readers is very long. In addition to public recognition, he enjoyed the recognition of his fellow musicians, such as guitarist John Williams or Venezuelan Antonio Lauro, who invited him to be a part of the jury for a classical guitar competition in Caracas.His life was the journey of an African pioneer, a man rooted in his cultural heritage and carrying a message of sharing and hope for the world. His originality continues to vibrate around the world since his passing at the end of May 2001.

Solo Guitar - Level 3 - Digital Download SKU: A0.1032084 Composed by Edwin Culver. 20th Century,Contemporary. Individual part. 4 pages. Edwin Culver #4347575. Published by Edwin Culver (A0.1032084). Classical Guitar Solo - IntermediateComposed by Edwin Culver (1992-) 4 Pages.  Duration 7'30Composer's note: Have you ever felt stuck? Trapped by something you can’t fully understand no matter how hard you try?  Perhaps it’s something from our past that we never invited...or something we’ve missed in our closest relationships, maybe it’s just the dread we’ve felt waking up early in the morning to repeat the daily grind.  We work hard to try and propel ourselves out of this nightmare, but we never seem to get totally free, in fact sometimes it feels like we’re just making ourselves feel worse by failing to overcome it yet again. This piece, ...a bridge a-way, exits within, represents that feedback loop, that stuckness.    The piece came to me when I felt stuck in life by several things - old scars, old habits, crippling emotions.  I had been wanting to write something in a minimalist style for the guitar for quite some time and the repetition found in so much minimalist music seemed like the obvious way for expressing this stuckness.  There’s constant motion in the piece, just like when we try to take constant action in our lives to improve our circumstances. But all this motion never seems to get us anywhere new. We’re spinning our wheels…But one of the interesting things about great minimalist music is that it’s not merely about repetition.  I don’t believe the greatest minimalists were concerned with having less stuff in their music for the sake of having less.  Instead, what I think they more often aimed for was producing the biggest emotional impact that they could through the tiniest of changes.  And if in your mind’s eye you zoom out from one of these minimalist masterworks and perceive it on a grand scale, you realize that despite all the seemingly redundant repetition in the moment the piece actually covers a huge distance because all those tiny changes add up.Likewise, in ...a bridge a-way, exits within, it seems like the performer can’t free himself from the territory of the first position on the guitar for the longest time.  Even when he does venture higher up the instrument he’s always inextricably pulled back to the starting point. But small changes can have a profound impact.It doesn’t feel like we’re making headway whenever we’re having to crawl out of our skin - until, suddenly, when it’s all over.  And you hear this towards the end of the piece, when there’s a sudden magnetic force that pulls the music from a low A to a high E-natural.  From A to E, a bridge to exits eternal. The bridge has been found within, in the One I’ve put my trust in, because I can’t reach my eternal destiny on my own.   This is ...a bridge a-way, exits within.

Solo Guitar - Level 4 - Digital Download SKU: A0.876582 Composed by Daniel Cueto. 20th Century,Contemporary,Latin,World. Individual part. 8 pages. Daniel Cueto #6119401. Published by Daniel Cueto (A0.876582). To write Tiento para un pensador, I found inspiration in an experience that I had many years ago, when I was a student in Dusseldorf, Germany. I was spending time one night with my friend Rafael Aguirre, a virtuoso classical guitarist, as he was casually playing through some of his repertoire. He asked me if I thought that it was possible to play a Baroque fugue - one of the most complex of musical genres - on the guitar. Before I had time to think about the question, he started playing his own arrangement of a fugue by J.S. Bach, talking me through it as the fugue theme appeared in different registers and the counterpoint got more and more intricate.The effectiveness and beauty of the contrapuntal sounds I experienced that night stayed with me. So in 2020, when I was invited to attend the Twisted Spruce Symposium and had a chance to compose my first piece for the guitar, I quickly decided that I would take up the challenge of writing my own fugue for the instrument. Looking to find a more specific context for the new work, I discovered the early Spanish genre of the tiento, essentially an early Hispanic form of the fugue. I came up with a melody which, I sensed, featured elements of that early style combined with a touch of Andean melancholy. As I composed, I strived to follow this basic affect throughout, letting the lines evolve organically as the piece seemed to engage in a long, continued search for its cultural and temporal identity.Para un pensador means for a thinker in Spanish. It is my homage to the intellectual guitarist, to the reflective and discerning performer of intricate contrapuntal music.I would like to extend special thanks to Nathan Fischer for producing this valuable edition of Tiento para un pensador.