By Richard Gilewitz

Florida’s Newport Guitar Festival, held at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in the Dania Beach/Ft. Lauderdale area in April, once again proved to be an exciting time with everything guitar happening for a solid three-day extravaganza. Being familiar with the set up, as I had been a part of the festival when it was held at the Miami Convention Center, I was honored to be part of the 2010 festival.

Unlike the NAMM (National Association for Music Merchants) shows with invitation and badge only admittance, the general public is openly invited and encouraged to attend the Newport Guitar event since it provides an opportunity to partake in the festivities held amongst some of the worlds finest luthiers.

The festival also gave me the opportunity to conduct a few workshops on fingerstyle guitar techniques, including a study of the Blues as well as play and demonstrate some very amazing instruments from around the world. Some of these folks included Schenk Guitars out of Seattle Washington, Laurie Williams Guitars from New Zealand, and Washburn Guitars for my friends at Total Music Source based in Florida

I must admit that the one guitar that really got my attention was crafted from cement.  An enterprising individual, promoting his pickup design, had attached a pickup and a neck to an entire cement block.  I took a stab at one of my earliest favorite pieces and played Classical Gas by Mason Williams.  It was a gas, to say the least, and although my left leg is still a bit numb I’m thinking of including it during my workshops and concert at the upcoming Miami International Guitar Festival in June. I should be good to go by then.

For this month’s Fingerstyle Section, I would stay away from cement blocks, as Study for Margot by David Walbert is a beautiful piece that is played with feeling and respect. I have chosen the first half of this composition by my own teacher, whom I have been studying with since my college days, as his pieces are some of the most spectacular and fulfilling to play. During my studies with David we worked out the fingerings on a number of the pieces as his compositions were written for classical guitar and I wanted to record them on my steel string acoustics. I released twelve of them on the 2000 CD, “The Music of David Walbert”, available at http://www.richardgilewitz.com.  Study for Margot and two other compositions by David are available from Mel Bay Publications’ catalog, “Master Anthology of New Classic Guitar Solos”

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Richard Gilewitz’s Bio

Suggested Titles:

Acoustic Fingerstyle Guitar Workshop Book/CD/DVD Set
by Richard Gilewitz 

Master Anthology of New Classic Guitar Solos, Volume 1 Book/CD Set
by Stephen Rekas