Some players treat the guitar as a thing with rules and some treat it as an object that happens to have strings on it. The second approach produces evenings that are difficult to describe afterwards and impossible to confuse with anything else. Expect long passages that do not resolve, sudden shifts into something almost conventionally beautiful, and a room that stays very quiet because everybody can hear exactly how much is being decided in real time. This is not background music and cannot be enjoyed at a remove. The audience is small, slightly obsessive and tends to include other musicians, which gives the room a watchful quality. If you have been listening to the same forty records for a year and have started to find that comfortable, this is the recommended cure, and you will either leave irritated or recalibrated. Both outcomes are worth the ticket.
Some players treat the guitar as a thing with rules and some treat it as an object that happens to have strings on it. The second approach produces evenings that are difficult to describe afterwards and impossible to confuse with anything else. Expect long passages that do not resolve, sudden shifts into something almost conventionally beautiful, and a room that stays very quiet because everybody can hear exactly how much is being decided in real time. This is not background music and cannot be enjoyed at a remove. The audience is small, slightly obsessive and tends to include other musicians, which gives the room a watchful quality. If you have been listening to the same forty records for a year and have started to find that comfortable, this is the recommended cure, and you will either leave irritated or recalibrated. Both outcomes are worth the ticket.
Some players treat the guitar as a thing with rules and some treat it as an object that happens to have strings on it. The second approach produces evenings that are difficult to describe afterwards and impossible to confuse with anything else. Expect long passages that do not resolve, sudden shifts into something almost conventionally beautiful, and a room that stays very quiet because everybody can hear exactly how much is being decided in real time. This is not background music and cannot be enjoyed at a remove. The audience is small, slightly obsessive and tends to include other musicians, which gives the room a watchful quality. If you have been listening to the same forty records for a year and have started to find that comfortable, this is the recommended cure, and you will either leave irritated or recalibrated. Both outcomes are worth the ticket.