Customer Rating: 
Summary: Beautiful
Comment: Great listening when you want to relax or even when you're working. Anyone into classic guitar and of course, the wonderful period of Baroque music, I highly recommend this.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Superb baroque music festival for the guitar
Comment: I have most of these pieces on a book of Essential Classical Guitar, as I'm picking up the instrument again. This is not only an enlightnening CD, it's just great music, very well played. I can compare some of the pieces to other recordings in compilations, also very well played. But Julian Bream breathes, does not put the accent on virtuosity but more on musical phrasing, takes a slightly slower tempo sometimes (the lovely Bach prelude in d). I love playing it on my iPod in the background, it soothes me while I'm doing mechanical work. All the CD is worth it, esp. at this price. I would've paid full price for it. Unlike other reviewers, I'm not at all bothered by the recording quality, it's perfectly adequate; although there is no attempt to dissimulate the hiss due to shifting between positions, there isn't as much of it to disrupt listening, and the sound is otherwise rich and full with harmonies. In fact, the (very occasional) hissing enhances the "real" aspect of the recording so I don't mind. I hear them too when I play (although I'm not an advanced player by any means). The most dynamic pieces (Sanz' Canarios, Bach's Prelude and fugue, Weiss' Fantasy, Bach's suite allemande, bourree and gigue) alternate with more pensive, almost lethargic pieces by de Visee. Overall, this is a great CD that I put among the top five or six in my classical guitar collection. Also "Essential Guitar" compilation has some of these pieces and more romantic and 19th century pieces, if you want to compare. I also highly recommend that CD.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Bream does a superlative job
Comment: Bream was one of the best guitarists in the history of the instrument (was, since he retired a few years back). This may sound extreme, but nearly all his recordings bear witness to this. In addition to impeccable technique and musicianship, he shows a control of color and shading second to none. He is somewhat less romantic than Segovia, but his range of expression is just as varied. In some later recordings, Bream sounds as if he chooses beauty of sound at the expense of using slightly deliberate pacing, but in all earlier outings (like this one), he combines tonal beauty with perfectly chosen tempos (or tempi if you prefer), a great sense of enjoyment, even of fun when appropriate. Bream always reveals something remarkable in the music that goes beyond nearly all other players.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Awesome
Comment: This is a CD that is not only unusual - Guitar but well worth having in your collection.
Customer Rating:
Summary: One of the greatest masterpieces of guitar recordings of all time
Comment: When Julian Bream came to the San Francisco conservatory in the early 1980's he began by addressing the masterclass of eager guitarists by saying "I am not a guitarist. Rather, I am a musician who plays the guitar."
This album demonstrates the high standard of truth of his statement.
Originally released in 1965 by RCA, this recording is one of the finest ever made. Bream was at one of the several heights of his musical mastery.
Of the opening tracks by Gaspar Sanz, both the stately Pavanas and the famous Canarios are models of exquisite phrasing, dynamic rhythmic energy and dramatic character.
J.S. Bach's Prelude in D minor is much superior to Andres Segovia's earlier recording. It is a bit slower in tempo, yet has a fabulous pulse that underlies the arpeggio figurations. The following fugue in A minor is a still miraculous model of contrapuntal clarity, drama, rhythmic drive and sheer exuberance. All the many guitarists of my generation measured their own efforts in relation to this rendition.
Fernando Sor's Fantasie and Minuet are completely captivating in the 19th century style. Bream had an affinity for Sor's music and also the taste to record only the small handful of Sor's opus which stood above the mundane.
Bream's recordings of the lutenist S. L. Weiss works take us back to the baroque. Weiss was a friend of Bach and the Passacaille, Fantasie and Tombeau chosen here remain among the greatest recordings ever made. The transcription is especially tricky since the baroque lute used a very different tuning and had 13 courses. Bream was the first to really make a definitive case for playing Weiss on the guitar, and these renditions demonstrate why.
The Suite in D minor of Robert de Visee is by far the best for the transcription he used. Later Bream revisited the original sources and made better editions for his recordings. (See his re-recording of Sanz's Canarios in his album Guitarra)
Finally, the recording of the Lute Suite in E minor of J.S. Bach was a landmark in 1965. Today there are many recordings to choose from, but for my taste, nothing surpasses the total beauty, passion and realization of this recording.
I thank Mr. Bream everyday for this recording.
Buy this recording ASAP. Many of Breams great recordings are no longer available, so get it while you can.
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