Today, GuitarWorld.com presents the worldwide premiere of a new recording and performance video by the Commander-In-Chief, a seven-string guitarist from Norway who now lives in England, and classical guitarist Craig Ogden.
The uber-talented duo have collaborated on Caprice No. 24 by Niccolo Paganini, the 18th- and 19th-century Italian composer whose music has influenced scores of guitarists, including Yngwie Malmsteen.
It's the final caprice of Paganini's 24 Caprices, and a work that's usually associated with solo violin. It's considered one of the most difficult pieces ever written for solo violin.
It requires several advanced techniques such as parallel octaves and rapid shifting covering many intervals, extremely fast scales and arpeggios including minor scales in thirds and 10ths, left-hand pizzicato and quick string crossing.
"We chose Caprice 24 since it is the most challenging of all of Paganini's pieces, and I really love it," the Commander-In-Chief told us earlier today.
"It was very challenging to play, especially the pizzicata part, variation 9; it took a long time to get that one right. It starts at 3:50 [in the video]. It wasn't easy playing that on electric guitar."
Speaking of which, the Commander is playing an Ibanez S5527. The video was filmed at Kjeller Airfield in Norway.
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The song is from 2 Guitars: The Classical Crossover Album, the new album by the duo. For more info on the release (and to pre-order), visit pledgemusic.com.
You might remember the Commander-In-Chief from her last "guitar duel" video, a version of Pablo de Sarasate's Zigeunerweisen Op. 20 she recorded with classical guitarist Thomas Valeur in 2013. It was one of GuitarWorld.com's most popular videos of the year. You can watch it here.
This time, the Commander has teamed up with Ogden, who recently was featured as one of the top 20 classical guitarists of all time by ClassicFM. He's also the principal lecturer on guitar at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, England, and the visiting lecturer at London's Royal College of Music.
Damian is Editor-in-Chief of Guitar World magazine. In past lives, he was GW’s managing editor and online managing editor. He's written liner notes for major-label releases, including Stevie Ray Vaughan's 'The Complete Epic Recordings Collection' (Sony Legacy) and has interviewed everyone from Yngwie Malmsteen to Kevin Bacon (with a few memorable Eric Clapton chats thrown into the mix). Damian, a former member of Brooklyn's The Gas House Gorillas, was the sole guitarist in Mister Neutron, a trio that toured the U.S. and released three albums. He now plays in two NYC-area bands.
