Groupmuse to Host Guitarist Lyle Sheffler

Guitarist Lyle Sheffler (from a previous article on this site)

Once again I am indebted to Groupmuse for informing me about a recital that definitely deserves recognition. The recitalist is guitarist Lyle Sheffler, and I have been following his work for almost exactly nine years. I first encountered him in September of 2015, when the Elevate Ensemble launched its second season in the Recital Hall of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. On that occasion he was the soloist in a performance of Joaquín Rodrigo’s “Fantasía para un gentilhombre” (fantasia for a gentleman). Since that time, I have done my best to keep up with his solo recital gigs, announcing them and, when my Calendar would allow, attending them.

His program will augment music composed for guitar with works composed for earlier plucked instruments, such as the lute, and arrangements of keyboard music. Thus, he will begin his program with Domenico Scarlatti’s K. 322 keyboard sonata in A major. This will be followed by a work for piano, “Serenata Espagñola” by Joaquín Malats, whose use of folk idioms would subsequently influence another pianist-composer, Isaac Albéniz. The first work on the program actually composed for guitar will be “Schnee in Istanbul,” written by guitarist Carlo Domeniconi, who was particularly interested in Turkish music traditions. The first half will then conclude with “La Catedral” (the cathedral), probably the best-known work composed by guitarist Agustín Barrios.

The second half of the program will then continue with a second Barrios composition, “Las Abejas” (the bees). This will be followed by “Córdoba,” the second of the five movements in the Albéniz piano suite Chant d’Espagne (Opus 232). Sheffler will then return to the age of the lute with a performance of John Dowland’s “My Lade Hunsdon’s Puffe.” The final selection will be the first of the four guitar sonatas by Fernando Sor, a single-movement composition published in Paris in 1810 under the title “Grand solo pour guitare.”

This performance will take place in Noe Valley, beginning at 2 PM of Sunday, October 6. As of my current reading of the Web site, there will be places for 25 in the audience, and twelve of those seats are still available. (It may also be worth noting that, according to the Groupmuse Web page for making reservations, cats live at that venue!)