I was eagerly waiting for this new project from Patty Larkin to be released. The full title is La Guitara: Gender Bending Strings. It is in Patty's words " a glimpse of how women have influenced the guitar over time. We made a decision to create a collection of women instrumentalists from many different musical styles, and from many places around the world, including archival selections." In my opinion (shared by many) Patty is one of the greatest guitar players of all time, so I was very excited to hear what she would select for her tour of the distaff world of guitar playing.
The great classical player Sharon Isbin is featured on track two (La Catedral). The tracks fro two other classical artists I am not familiar with ( Muriel Anderson -the first woman to have won the National Finger Picking Guitar Championship- and Badi Assad) are also quite good.
From old blues-playing Memphis Minnie to the jazz stylings of Mimi Fox, the CD encompasses all types of guitar work. My only complaints are that the final three tracks are barely over one minute in length (the CD is only 40 minutes long, so it's not like she was running out of space), and are just little snippets. And, the track Ms. Larkin included of her own work is less interesting than many of her other tour de forces, say Banish Misfortune/Open Hand or even Solo Flight.
All in all, a good CD for study, but the Isbin track is the only one I will be returning to with regularity.
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