Musical instrument from the
guitar family. Also called
Spanish guitar.
The classical guitar is distinguished by a number of features.
- It's an acoustic? instrument. The sound is amplified by a [sound box]?.
- It has six strings.
- The strings are made from cat gut?, or much more commonly these days nylon, as opposed to the metal strings found in some other forms of guitar. These strings have a much lower tension than steel strings.
- Because of the low tension of the strings the neck can be made entirely of wood, not requiring a steel truss road.
- The neck tends to be broader then with steel string guitars, making more complex work easier, but requiring a left hand position which ultimately makes the guitar less stable to hold.
- The strings are usually plucked with the fingers.
The heyday of the classical guitar repertoire lies in the 19th century. Some guitar composers are:
- [Dionisio Aguado]? 1784-1849
- Matteo Carcassi 1792-1853
- [Fernando Carulli]? 1770-1841
- [Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco]? 1895-1968
- [Napoleon Coste]? 1806-1883
- [Mauro Giuliani]? 1780-1840
- [Luigi Legnani]? 1790-1877
- [Miguel Llobet]? 1878-1937
- [Joaquin Rodrigo]? 1901-1999
- [Fernando Sor]? 1778-1839
- [Francisco Tarrega]? 1852-1909
- [Heitor Villa-Lobos]? 1887-1959
Because of the relative scarcity of pieces, guitarists often play transcriptions of music originally written for other instruments.
Classical guitar players:
- [Manuel Barrueco]?
- [Julian Bream]? 1933
- [Andrés Segovia]? 1893-1987
- [Narciso Yepes]? 1927-1997
- [John Williams]? 1941