Paco Pena - Flamenco Mass at Manchester Cathedral

The world's foremost flamenco guitarist, Paco Pena, is set to perform his astonishing and utterly riveting 'Flamenco Mass' with full choir, flamenco guitarists, singers and dancers live in the grand surroundings of Manchester Cathedral on Friday 20th April 2012 for an exclusive UK show.



Born and raised in the Spanish heartland of Cordoba, Paco Pena is considered one of the world's greatest living exponents of the haunting and passionate art of Flamenco. His virtuoso guitar playing, alongside his Paco Pena Flamenco Dance Company, has toured all the major concert halls of the world to huge international acclaim.



Now considered one of his greatest works, Pena has re-written the traditional church mass for flamenco guitars, dancer and large-scale choir to brilliant effect. By combining the melodic and rhythmic nuances from flamenco with the texts of the Liturgy, Paco Pena creates something that is revelatory and joyous to watch in equal measure.



The concert will feature Paco Pena on flamenco guitar, a full choir as well as flamenco guitarists, singers and flamenco dancers live.



“His total dedication of almost incredible technical skill so ensuring that listeners, held a packed house enraptured.” -The Daily Telegraph



Tickets/Info: http://bandonthewall.org/events/3371/



Tickets also available by calling 0845 2 500 500.

London Guitar Festival 8-10th March 2012

Hi Folks

Fed up with the bonus culture?  Depressed about the austerity cuts, politicians, big society, miserable weather? Missed out on getting your tickets for the Olympic Games?
Time to cheer up and  join in the London Guitar Festival !

The Festival has some great concert highlights including performances from Hemanos Cuenca and Fernando Espi, The Vida Guitar Quartet, David Gibb and Elly Lucas  and the hosting of the final for the London International Guitar Competition (far more entertaining than the Olympic Opening ceremony and not ONE IOC official in sight!!)

Visit the London Guitar Festival Website for more information. More information and flyers will be available at the next BGS Meeting (Saturday 18th Feb).

Federation of Guitar Societies

Annual General Meeting to be held on 24th June 2012


The AGM of the Federation of Guitar Societies will take place on Sunday 24th June 2012. This year it will be hosted by the North Bucks Guitar Club and held at Woburn Village Hall - Crawley Road, Woburn MK17 9QD
The day will start at 10.30am and end at 4.30pm. Peter Nuttall will be leading us in the ensemble work, and in the afternoon each society will have 10 minutes to play its own musical piece(s). This event is also a fun social occasion for us all to meet and we hope we can get all societies represented on the day.


There will be a charge of £10 per person to cover the cost of the hire of the hall, refreshments etc. We would be grateful if each society would nominate someone to liaise with Wendy Wagstaffe at the North Bucks Guitar Club, and let her know how many people will be attending. Please inform your members who do not have access to the Federation's website about this event.

Emails please asap to wendy.wagstaffe@yahoo.co.uk with the contact details of the society’s representative. The numbers of those attending from each society should reach Wendy by 31st MARCH - please note that we can acommodate a total of sixty people. Alternatively, you can telephone her on 01462 621920

January Meeting

Your correspondent receiving some much needed
advice from his grandson

A belated Happy New Year to all members of the Bromley Guitar Society!

Unfortunately I missed the last meeting which explains my absence from the photo in the last issue...probably just as well- an overweight Aussie is not a pretty sight!! Still it is great to return back from Australia, after a stint of grand parenting, to take up the cudgels once more and faithfully record the highs and lows (not that there are too many of those) of life in the BGS.

I have also been a bit remiss in keeping abreast with developments in the Classical Guitar World and I hope to put that right this year! One of my New Year Resolutions!!

Upon returning for the first meeting this January, I was pleased (and secretly terrified) to note how advanced the standard of ensemble performance was since I attended the November Meeting. Tributes have to be paid to members John Mann and Rob Sellery who have proved to be worthy successors to Ray Butcher in organising and ably leading everyone through the mysteries of Joporo (Forrest) and Minuet and Trio (Von Calls). We were introduced to these pieces in November and the reason for my terror is that everyone has steamed ahead with the pieces with the exception of yours truly who has a bit of work on his hands in order to catch up!!

 I am indebted (along with all the other players of Guitar part 1) to Den Stockton for annotating the Joporo piece with finger placement guides which were invaluable! And it was great to see the return of our old Enfield task master Ray Butcher , who dropped in after a long absence! And he is still on form!!

As per usual we were treated to an evening of excellent solo performances as well.

Solos included
Falling Tears composed and performed by Danny Kim
Somebody Loves Me (Gershwin) performed by Freddie Carvalho
Pla-it Cool (Dunlea)
That's a Wrap (Dunlea)
Stripey Strips (Dunlea) All three pieces performed by Jenny Wormald

11 Junction St, Newstead (composed and performed by Andrew Ferrier and dedicated to his Grandson)

Stairway to Heaven  and Joropo (Merlin) performed by Dave Hampton
 Vals Poetico No.1 (Granados) Larisa Lieberman and Vince Chittenden
Scarborough Fair performed by Vince Chittenden

We are grateful to Vince and his sound pixies for recording and publishing the solos.
 The link can be found here http://www.questel.co.uk/bgs/bgs21.shtml

Special thanks to Rob and John for the work they have put into the ensemble work.  Thanks to their efforts,  we are confident that we will have something to show for the Federation of Guitar Societies meeting in July (need to check) as well as the next Beckenham Music festival.

And my thanks to Larisa who organised the refreshments for the evening.

See you all soon

Andrew Ferrier Hon Sec BGS