What a nice little disc this is, it's re-issued by Decca in a number of guises, but the original as here, is the best way to acquire this, the visuals are excellent, but i'll speak more of that in the next paragraph, of course Rodrigo's two most popular Guitar Works go well together, but since they only make up roughly 45 minutes of music, the question is what to couple them with?, and it's good to have Castelnuovo-Tedesco's work here, the Rodrigo is justly famous for its quotations from the solo guitar works of Gaspar Sanz, Rodrigo orchestrates them, and adds his own special touch to the four pieces, there's very much a sense of the baroque of yesteryear in the writing, which is very similar to what Respighi did with his Ancient Airs And Dances, the same sort of feel, it's a lovely work regardless of how it was 'mined' from another Composer.
Eduardo Fernandez is Uruguayan, he is now 60, he made this recording in 1985 when he was 33, the front cover is a truly superlative photograph, the photographer is not mentioned in the booklet / back insert, which is a shame, the photo is of a courtyard in Navarra, showing the ancient building, lovely tiled roofs, and an octagonal fountain in the middle, but what really makes the picture are three elements, the sunshine, which seems a little washed out on the foreground wall, the darkness of inside juxtaposed against the light outside. and especially the arch which frames the whole thing so superbly, the colours and the lettering add to the whole thing.
The second movement is so wonderful, it's the slow movement of the work, and the longest at just over 10 minutes, in fact it's almost as long as the other three movements put together,.
Here's Ekachai Jeerakul playing the second movement on YouTube.
