Phil Mathieu: Press

PHIL MATHIEU AND GIORGIA
CAVALLARO
“American Music
for Two Guitars”
Independent
Who is William Foden and why
have guitarists Phil Mathieu
and Giorgia Cavallaro devoted
nearly an entire album to his
genius? Born in 1860, the St. Louis
native is remembered in guitar circles
— to the extent that he's
remembered at all these days —
for his virtuosity, compositions,
arrangements and instructional
method books. Mathieu and
Cavallaro are a pair of latter disciples,
custodians of a rich but
underappreciated legacy.
Though far removed from his
twangy alliance with Ruthie and
the Wranglers, Mathieu sounds
comfortable in this setting. He and
Cavallaro are well matched, playing
nylon string guitars throughout
most of their recording,
“American Music for Two Guitars.”
Foden, who died shortly after
World War II, is represented by a
pair of lengthy interludes. The
seven part “Neo Baroque-Suite”
finds the guitarists nimbly moving
through a colorful assortment of
French and Italian dances, from
the intricately woven “Allemande”
to the neatly harmonized
“Gavotte” to the courtly coda
“Bouree.” The second section is
devoted to songs and dances that
radiate more homegrown charm
and features previously unrecorded
Foden pieces, including the
unabashedly romantic “Flowery
Dell Waltz.” Whether composing
or arranging, Foden apparently
had a gift for making the most of
melodies, allowing them to linger
in the air. Mathieu and Cavallaro
follow suit, honoring his memory
and work with an appropriately
lyrical touch. The album closes, by
the way, with a rootsy twist.
Mathieu's own “Sugarloaf Rag” is
brightly orchestrated by the duo’s
steel string and resonator guitars.
-- Mike Joyce
Friday, January 7, 2005
O N T H E T O W N

Monday, January 10, 2005
Style
Guitarists Phil Mathieu and Giorgia
Cavallaro boiled down the raison
d'etre of their selections Saturday at
Strathmore Hall by reciting the Walt
Whitman lines “I hear America singing,
the varied carols I hear.” Like
Whitman, whose poem touched on the
broadly democratic vistas of America,
the duo presented music celebrating its
more commonplace beauties. It was a
program that reminisced on homespun
Hausmusik—most of it originally
meant for a guitar duo—which invited
Americans to sing along and dance as
the 19th century edged into the 20th.
Strathmore’s massive stone fireplace
behind the guitarists conjured visions
of family and friends gathered around
as they played works by William Foden
(1860-1947) that Mathieu discovered
recently. Six “Songs and Dances”—
waltzes, a polka, a fandango—resonated
a pleasant archaic tunefulness that
other American composers such as
Louis Moreau Gottschalk earlier and
Edward MacDowell, Foden’s exact
contemporary, forged into solid art
music. Foden’s “Neo-Baroque Suite”
aspired to re-create Bach’s era, but it
lacks that fundamental dissonance
impelling the older scores.
Another curious but slightly more
substantial ode to Bach followed intermission:
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s
Prelude and Fugue in A from his
“Well-Tempered Guitars,” Op. 199.
The first piece was a grotesque takeoff
on Gershwin’s “I Got Plenty o’ Nothin’”
from “Porgy and Bess.” Cavallaro was at
her best in her arrangement of
“Shenandoah,” while both musicians
rendered Mathieu’s setting of “ ’Tis the
Last Rose of Summer” with glowing
timbres.
– Cecelia Porter
Phil Mathieu, Giorgia Cavallaro
Phil Mathieu and Giorgia Cavallaro