{"id":143611,"date":"2024-03-03T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-03T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/?p=143611"},"modified":"2024-02-28T10:14:58","modified_gmt":"2024-02-28T18:14:58","slug":"wolfgang-muthspiel-explores-western-tradition-and-nylon-string-guitar-as-a-jazz-improviser","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wolfgang-muthspiel-explores-western-tradition-and-nylon-string-guitar-as-a-jazz-improviser\/","title":{"rendered":"Wolfgang Muthspiel Embraces Both the Western Tradition and the Nylon-String Guitar in His Work as a Jazz Improviser"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In February of 2022, Austrian jazz guitarist Wolfgang Muthspiel walked into 25th Street Recording in Oakland, California, to make his 24th album as a leader. Accompanying him were acoustic bassist Scott Colley and drummer Brian Blade, esteemed players with whom he had shared many a gig over the years\u2014and who\u2019d also been the rhythm section for his previous album, 2020\u2019s Angular Blues<\/a><\/em>. Muthspiel had some precomposed material ready to go for the session, but he also set aside time for total improvisation, moments where the trio could be free to follow a few random threads and see what might be woven from them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At one such moment, Muthspiel picked up his trusty classical guitar, custom-designed by Australian luthier Jim Redgate, and plucked out a series of intriguingly dissonant chords. Colley responded by grabbing his bow and establishing a deep drone replete with ominous upper harmonics. Mallets in hand, Blade followed his partners\u2019 lead, leaning into cymbal washes and subtle tom rumbles. The pace of the guitarist\u2019s fingerpicking grew faster as the piece built in volume\u2014and then, all of a sudden, over the rising ambient backdrop, Muthspiel began playing a familiar tune: \u201cO Haupt voll Blut und Wunden\u201d (\u201cO Sacred Head, Now Wounded\u201d), one of the stately chorales from Johann Sebastian Bach\u2019s St. Matthew Passion<\/em>. Bass and drums soon retreated into respectful silence, leaving the acoustic guitar to complete the passage on its own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can hear this piece just as it went down in the studio over the course of four minutes on Muthspiel\u2019s latest collection, Dance of the Elders<\/a><\/em> (ECM), under the title \u201cPrelude to Bach.\u201d (In fact, Bach didn\u2019t write the melody of \u201cO Haupt voll Blut und Wunden,\u201d which is by early Baroque composer Hans Leo Hassler, but his harmonization and arrangement of it for choir and orchestra has led to its being strongly associated with the maestro of Leipzig for the past three centuries.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking by Zoom from his home in Austria, Muthspiel, 58, swears that no part of this track was planned. \u201cI\u2019d never played that chorale before in the studio or in a concert,\u201d he says. \u201cIt all happened in a conversational way, and when we reached this tremolo thing between the bass and drums, it seemed like it would be a good moment for a real song. That was the first song that came to my mind. It fit the tonality, and I wanted to play it softer under [Colley and Blade]. So yeah, that was a lucky moment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Wolfgang
Photo: \u00a9 Laura Pleifer<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Steeped in the Tradition<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

That an episode of free improv would naturally lead Muthspiel into an extended Bach quote indicates just how rooted he is in the Western classical tradition. And the fact that he was playing a Redgate at the time also demonstrates his long-held passion for the nylon-string acoustic guitar, which predates his interest in the electric guitar and in jazz. He started taking classical lessons at 13, a lateral move from his first instrument, the violin, which he\u2019d been playing since age six. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI became completely obsessed by the guitar as a teenager,\u201d he recalls, \u201cand my left hand was already fairly agile from playing violin, so I quickly got into pieces that I really liked. I was heavily into the Bach lute suites, and I transcribed The Goldberg Variations<\/em> for two guitars\u2014I drove my musical partner at the time crazy because I wanted to rehearse it all the time!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As much as he loved classical guitar, the teenage Muthspiel soon found himself running into an issue: lack of repertoire. \u201cMany of the great masters didn\u2019t write for guitar,\u201d he says. \u201cNo Haydn, no Mozart, no Beethoven. There are some good pieces here and there, but in the Classical and Romantic periods, there\u2019s hardly anything that\u2019s really great. A lot of classical guitarists will hate to hear me say this, but it\u2019s my opinion. So you have to be creative as a classical guitarist to get good, original repertoire, and to play the pieces exactly like you<\/em> hear them, not just like your teacher told you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A couple of years into his classical training, Muthspiel began to hear the siren song of jazz and, along with it, the electric guitar. He eventually moved to the U.S. to study at Boston\u2019s New England Conservatory of Music and Berklee College of Music. There he became a member of vibraphonist Gary Burton\u2019s quintet, occupying a chair formerly taken by such legends as Larry Coryell, Mick Goodrick (one of Muthspiel\u2019s teachers), and Pat Metheny. With Burton and on his own early albums as a leader in the late 1980s and early \u201990s, Muthspiel focused on electric playing. But as his career continued to evolve, the acoustic gradually found its way back in, and it\u2019s been a regular part of his studio and live work for at least the past decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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