Charleston Daily Mail

Guitarist dazzles crowd with Italian Instrument

by Rick Justice

Monday December 3, 2007

For the Daily Mail

This weekend, I had the great good fortune to meet a new and most wonderful guitar. Made by a contemporary Italian master, it was beautifully marked with a tricolor sound board (the top with the hole in it), and its sound was magical.

With a blond cedar strip in the middle book-ended by two glowing planks of Italian Alps spruce, it is somewhat of a hybrid. Many luthiers have tried to blend the distinctive sonorities of the two woods, with up and down success.

This instrument is a great success and I'll tell you why. Its owner, Robert Gruca, was a guest of the Charleston Chamber Music Society for Sunday's concert, as well as for conducting a master class Saturday.

He began the concert at Christ Church United Methodist with a three-movement sonatina by Jorge Morel that gave him and the instrument time to adjust to the room environment and to make some lovely music.

The second work was Suite No. 7 for harpsichord by G. F. Handel, and it was at the very beginning of the piece that wonderful and strange musical things started.

Handel begins the first movement, "Ouverture," as a slow rambling rubato with such a plethora of embellished turns and trills that the whole mood shouts of Rococo.

The guitar's tonal colors, from the bridge to the base of the neck, seemed to be nearly infinite, depending on where the artist plucked the strings and with which parts of his fingers and in which direction he struck with his fingernails.

It was then that I began to really grasp what a special musical synergy was taking place.

This was a great player with a great instrument.

Gruca returned to the stage after intermission with Isaac Albeniz's Suite Espanolo, a five-movement work that painted the sights, smells and sounds of five different Spanish cities.

Once again guitarist and instrument were able to bring almost visceral evocations of these places of guitar ancestry into the hall. I spoke to the executive director of the Charleston Chamber Music Society, David Stern, and suggested that his group book Robert Gruca back next year at the present rate, because I feel that as so often happens, the brighter Gruca's star begins to shine, and bright shining it will be, we may not be able to afford him.

Many thanks to the Chamber Music Society for bringing such quality music to our fair town.