Guitarist Xuefei Yang’s New Album

Guitarist Xuefei Yang’s new album: 40 Degrees North. Chinese title: 杨雪霏:北纬四十度.

Recently bought the CD+DVD version of Xuefei Yang’s 2nd international release and I thought of sharing it here. This album succeeds her debut album “Romance de Amor” that was released in 2006. You can have a look at this if you would like to find out more about her.  She is an inspiration to aspiring guitarists.

This album comprises of music from Spain and China, and is given its title because the capital cities of Spain (birth place of the Classical guitar) and China (Xuefei’s birth place) lie near latitude 40 degrees north. The Spanish classical pieces are composed by Isaac Albéniz, Francisco Tárrega, and Enrique Granados. The Chinese pieces ranged from traditional and folk songs like the Jasmine Flower (much popularised by Kenny G on the saxophone) to the symphonic work of Butterfly Lovers Concerto. See track listing here.

This could be the first time that the “Butterfly Lovers” is ever being played on the guitar. Originally composed for the violin, the “Butterfly Lovers Concerto” or  梁山伯与祝英台协奏曲, is one of symbolic concertos written by the Chinese for the western symphony orchestra. It has been performed on many other musical instruments, with accompaniment of a full orchestra.

Fei’s arrangement for the guitar comprises the 1st part of the concerto (first 3 movements) and she played it solo without any accompaniment. Despite so, you could still the experience the orchestration of the music from that one instrument. I would very much like to see her performing the entire piece comprising of 7 movements with a full symphony.

Do check out on this album and in any case, if you couldn’t get hold of the version that comes with the DVD, the content of the DVD is available online from here.

I would like to invite you to participate in the poll below, just to hear from you whether you would like library@esplanade to obtain a copy of this album.