Track Listing

1. Spirit Lake
2. Ralph's Piano Waltz
3. Train Of Thought
4. Zoetrope
5. Nardis
6. Chelsea Courtyard
7. Timeless

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #77220 in Music
• Released on: 2000-03-07
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Live

Amazon.com
This CD catches guitarist Ralph Towner at a 1979 solo concert, but as the title of the closing John Abercrombie tune suggests, there's a timeless quality to Towner's music, from crystalline runs to singing harmonics. It's not just the unadorned sounds of his acoustic 12-string and classical guitars but what he does with them. Towner's astonishing 12-string technique reaches back through folk sources to suggest a baroque harpsichord, while his modal improvisations return the Miles Davis influence (e.g., "Nardis") to its original flamenco and near-Eastern sources. While the appeal of combining folk, classical, world, and jazz elements can easily lead to pastiche, this concert emphasizes shared features. What could easily be the display of empty technique in lesser hands becomes whole music in Towner's hands--a complex, rhythmically vital, personal idiom. --Stuart Broomer

Customer Reviews

One of the best solo accoustic guitar records ever
Ralph Towner has, in my opinion, created two 'classic' recordings which everyone should hear at least once in their lives. This record is one of the two (the other is 'Blue Sun' recorded some 6 years later).

This record is nothing more or less than a solo guitar performance, recorded live in Munich in the late 1970s. Playing both 12 string and 6 string guitars (not at the same time of course) Ralph accomplishes the remarkable feat of making all 40 minutes of music wonderfully interesting. The opening track 'Spirit Lake' is such a beautiful piece of music, it is uplifting in the best sense of the word.

For years Ralph was just a member of the jazz group 'Oregon' but in the mid-70s he started recording solo records for the ECM label. Some of these recordings feel more like jazz than others, others less like jazz and more like classical music. This record is very unlike jazz. In a very real sense this record could have been released by Windham Hill and it would have fit right in.

Bottom line: technical mastery combined with some lovely tunes in an inspired performance. A must-have for any lover of the accoustic guitar.

American Masterpiece
Ralph Towner's Solo Concert, recorded in 1979 at the height of a period when Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett were concertizing and recording solo performances, marks an ultimate high in the history of jazz guitar playing. Towner's technical approach to the instrument, incredibly originally-voiced compositions and deeply emotionally-charged performances make this recording a landmark. Solo Concert may be the finest hour for serious solo guitar jazz and improvisational music performances. Other great guitarists have recorded solo jazz standards and modern music but this recording is very different than those, largely because of Towner's artistic originality and musical weight. These qualities cannot be overstated. It is rare in all music to find an artist this deep and true - one who has developed a musical technique so great and yet maintains the ability to express himself without getting caught in the web of technique. Towner's now historic recording of 'Nardis' is perhaps one of the great performances of this tune. He captures both the spirit of Miles Davis' intentions and develops the improvisation in an idiomatic manner which sings on the guitar. Towner has long stated that he never wanted to play bop-related music on the classical guitar - he plays in a more straight-ahead style on the piano. After hearing Nardis, one only can wish that he would record more tunes of this sort. Yet, Towner as one of the great improvising composers has developed his own compositions as his vehicle for expression.
His 'Anna' and 'Anthem' are also truly remarkable, and in some ways mark another evolutionary step for him - he seems to improve with age - but there is some quality to this recording which seems never again to be captured. Listen to his expressions on the 12-string in 'Spirit Lake' for example. This recording is for those who are willing to be captured in a sound world totally unusual -even for those experienced in the complexties of music. This music is at times simple, and complex yet easy to listen to. Mostly though, Towner's performances are simply captivating. Here he offers what a real new age of music could be - a vernacular american masterpiece.

Solitary majesty
Ralph Towner's Solo Concert sparkles with virtuosity -- his classically-precise fingerpicking is dazzling -- but it's the emotional depth of the "Chelsea Courtyard"/"Nardis""Timeless" sequence that makes this one of the most haunting recordings for solo guitar. Towner is all over the strings, combining dazzling harmonics with resonant muted bass passages, shading chords into silence, letting overtones hang in the air. Of the couple of hundred recordings of Miles Davis' sublime "Nardis," Towner's version here ranks up with the original Bill Evans Trio version as the very best. After the solo symphony of "Spirit Lake" and the atonal busyness of "Train of Thought," the record takes a profound turn inward. It's a trip worth taking.