Best edition currently available at SBM
Review by Mark C. on 27 Jul 2023 review stating Best edition currently available at SBM First of all, you should always shop at Strings by Mail first— these guys are the best! After I had initially submitted a brief one star review, Matt offered me the option to return this edition, however, after I collected my thoughts I realized that my irritation fell squarely on the shoulders of the publisher, not Strings by Mail. I’ve spent quite a lot of time since trying to figure out what is between the covers based on publishers descriptions, and, with rare exception, it can’t be done.
If you’re reading this, you probably already know that these Carcassi studies are unequaled in their value for the intermediate guitarist. The question then becomes: how many versions are available, and how to decide which to purchase (assuming you’ve decided not to just make do with the many free versions available on the Internet)? There appears to me to be four general choices: 1. Editions that strive to reproduce exactly what Carcassi composed--the best version (I think) is the Brian Jeffrey/Tecla edition, available here. 2. Llobet’s 1914 adaptation of the original manuscripts to suit the modern Tarrega/Torres guitar style. The best available edition of this revision is that by Michael Macmeeken, who was a student of Regino Sainz de la Maza, who studied with Llobet. I defy anyone to try and figure out if that is the version that you will get if you purchase this edition “Edited by: Stefano Grondona”, but the good news is that it is. 3. Modern re-fingered editions, such as the Alfred Classical Guitar Masterwork Edition, with fingerings by Aaron Shearer and performance notes by Thomas Kikta, Kami Rowan, and Ricardo Cobo. The performance notes are quite nice, and there are some interesting alternative fingerings, but I would not begin my Carcassi journey with this edition (unless you are already a Shearer devotee). 4. Unfingered editions, such as the beautifully typeset 25 Etudes Melodiques Progressives for solo guitar, published by DZ, and available here. As I get more familiar with the studies, I have been transferring my fingerings to this edition, which preserves all of the other original annotations, including dynamic markings.
In summary, if you are beginning Carcassi journey, and particularly if you do not have access to a guitar teacher, I highly recommend this LLobet version. So, why not five stars? Three reasons: the aforementioned misrepresentation of this edition as having been edited by Grondona rather than Macmeeken, the cluttered and off-color scores (although I imagine I should have been prepared for that in a “facsimile edition”), and the complete absence of any discussion of the alternative fingerings handwritten over the printed version. The good news and the bad news is that you can get all of this in the Schott/Chantarelle edition, but you can’t (yet) get it here. So, if you don’t mind those three caveats, I recommend this version as the best available here at Strings by Mail.
On Carcassi | 25 Etudes - Op. 60 and Op. 26 for solo guitar