In the Beginning is a collection of musical traditions and imaginative ideas drawn through my own interpretative lens in this debut recording. The musical works before you explore the near infinite adaptability of the guitar, both as a solo instrument and within the collaborative framework of chamber music, to changing musical styles and cultural expressions. In the illustrious tradition of my great teachers and forebears--Segovia, Ghiglia, Fisk, Waller and Estarellas--to name but a few, I have dedicated myself to expanding the guitar’s repertoire through collaboration with today’s foremost composers while continuing the search for music conceived at its inception for our musical relatives and awaiting transcription for the guitar. In this spirit, I have adapted to the guitar, Eugène Ysaÿe’s wild virtuoso masterwork, Prelude, “Obsession,” from the Sonata No.2, for solo violin. The work unravels Ysaÿe’s “obsession” with Bach, directly quoting Bach’s magnificent Prelude in E Major (Partita III, BWV 1006), for solo violin. Harnessing the manic curiosity and inspiration he experienced during a concert of Joseph Szigeti performing Bach, Ysaÿe sketched out six sonatas the following day, the second of which, recorded herein, contains contrasting moments of dark, demonic bi-polar decay and the ordered, harmonious genetic mappings inherent in Bach’s contrapuntal experiment. One finds resolution to the unsettling cacophony of Ysaÿe’s work by pairing it with the original. Bach’s E Major Prelude ingeniously threads thematic material through serial creative permutations, relentlessly propelling the piece toward its triumphant conclusion. The majesty and bourgeoning energy of Bach’s Prelude is followed by a mainstay of the modern virtuosic guitar repertoire: William Walton’s Five Bagatelles. As a series of musical vignettes, the Bagatelles weave through distinct personalities and unexpected turns, the mood shifting from “gin and fizz,” to simplicity and rhythmic equilibrium to the torrid and tropical heat of a blazing Cuban summer, then off to a languid ethereal landscape before galloping to a close in the fifth and final Bagatelle. Collaborating with violinist William Knuth and Israeli composer Jan Freidlin on Freidlin’s premier of Kafka Sonata for violin and guitar forged a creative synergy of shared musical ideas, striking spontaneous interpretations and a lifelong friendship. When asked about this work, Freidlin spoke of his sense of familiarity with Franz Kafka and the artist Vincent van Gogh; seemingly distinct personalities occupying distant artistic envelopes, whose fragile and broken worlds were united by their common aspirations to perfection. Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco was a master of any style he put his mind to, from movie music to his prolific catalogue of repertoire for the guitar. Though an Italian, and later in life a Californian, he captures the colorful images and ambiance of Spain in his musical series Platero y Yo from which I have selected, Golindrinas, Los Gitanos and Platero En el Cielo de Moguer for this recording. The program closes with the works of Joaquin Turina, a nationalistic Spaniard, whose unmistakably Spanish musical language is captured through bold idiomatic effects. Consider the Fandanguillo’s gentle tambora, suggesting the staccato of the dancer’s shoes rolling snare-like against a wooden stage or the quintessential Spanish rasqueados interspersed with small impressionistic brush strokes to create an elegant and expressive musical arch in the spirited communal dance, Sevillana-Fantasía. It is with great pleasure that I release this, the first in a planned series of recordings celebrating new and modern virtuosic works for the classical guitar alongside contemporary interpretations of established repertoire. In some sense, this marks the end of the beginning, both my own, and that of the classical guitar as it is delivered from a century and a half’s gestation to join its venerable stringed brethren on the world’s concert stages.