Podcast 463: Previewing the Alternative Guitar Summit with Joel Harrison

It was almost three years ago when I spoke with Joel Harrison about the Alternative Guitar Festival he was organizing. In the time that has passed, the event has grown to multiple days of performances and master classes, attracting six-string devotees from around the country. The 2015 event will take place in various locations around New York City. Shapeshifter Lab (February 4), and Rockwood Music Hall (February 6-8) will host performances, and master classes will take place at Spectrum. This festival of daring, inventive guitarists, who emphasize new and unusual approaches to the instrument, will once again celebrate the guitar’s enormous range, beyond style or genre. The 2015 AGS will feature as performers and instructors the likes of Harrison, Lee Ranaldo (of Sonic Youth fame), Liberty Ellman, David Gilmore, Miles Okazaki, Kenny Wessel, Doug Wamble, Adam Levy, Sheryl Bailey, Michael Gregory Jackson, Anders Nilsson, Marco Cappelli, Gyan Riley, David Fiuczynski, Prasanna, Ava Mendoza, Adam Rudolph, and others.\ Harrison made a point of making each day a thematic event; for example, February 6th has guitarists blending jazz improvisation and composition with techniques and sounds from India and the Middle East. February 7th features Adam Rudolph's Go: Organic Guitar Orchestra, and February 8th will focus on improvisers debuting singer/songwriter projects. Ticket information is available at the various venues websites, as well as Harrison’s website. If you have any interest in the guitar as a developing art form, this is for you, and our conversation will whet your appetite for the sights and sounds of the Festival. Musical selections that accompany our talk include Ava Mendoza (“Mandible Moonwalk”), David Fiuczynski’s Planet MicroJam (“Madoka Blue”), Lee Ranaldo (here with the Dust, playing “Hammer Head”), and Doug Wamble (“Fear Not the Fall”).