On Mother’s Day weekend, guitarist Stefan Roach hosted The Art of Guitar at the Little Carib Theatre, White Street, Woodbrook, before an appreciative audience. Joining Roach and performing under the name Los Gitanos were Rhys Thompson, Aaron Low Chew Tung and Marc Mahase.
Mikhail Moore also paid homage to the beauty of the classical guitar as a solo instrument.
The group also accompanied performances on other instruments which included the violin, pan and sitar. Cascade Festival Ballet Team dancer Georgia Lanser performed a solo to one of Roach’s original pieces—Milagrito (Little Miracle)—which was dedicated to his nephew, a cancer survivor.
Lanser also danced to another original composition by Roach—Rumba Exotica—a piece which fused the influences of Spain and the Middle East.
Versatile Soprano Raquel Winchester sang Habanera, a popular classical piece by Georges Bizet, which was done in a Spanish-style to the rhythm of rumba.
Popular young Shell Invaders/St Mary’s College pannist Luke Walker collaborated with Los Gitanos to perform another original composition by Roach—Island Beauty.
This piece blended Spanish guitar and a Caribbean vibe, embellished with a hint of soca rhythms. Sitarist Sharda Patasar performed with Roach in what turned out to be an amazing collaboration. Both artistes, dressed in traditional Indian wear, played their instruments on the stage floor.
The sitar inserted beautiful and intricate sounds into the duo’s performance of a classical guitar standard called Capricho Arabe, composed by “the Godfather of the classical guitar,” Francisco Tarrega.
The evening’s performance was hailed by patrons as “a progressive step in the evolution of the artiste, Stefan Roach,” whose ambition is to bring a new dimension to what is considered T&T music. (Darren Rampersad)
