Brasil Guitar Duo - Cinema Arts Centre - July 3, 2009

Everyone knows, perhaps, of my love of Kaki King, the way she and her instrument seem to be perfectly coalesced into one extraordinary musical state of being. Well, the Brasil Guitar Duo, João Luiz and Douglas Lora, is like Kaki King on crack. What I heard Friday night was an intensely focused, beautifully executed performance of several classical pieces. Like anything truly excellent, of course, their popularity isn't exactly teeming at the sides. The audience consisted of approximately a hundred at best (all of them well over 50, minus me and my wife; the youth were probably out watching Transformers, a movie I have yet to see and never will, more because it looks like it sucks rather than because it probably does.) Our duo performed like electrons hopping levels; Mr. Luiz seemed keenly stolid for the most part, weaving incredible streams of clustered notes along the entire guitar, whilst his other half, Mr. Lora, seemed so exasperated in his facial contortions that you wondered whether the music was actually using him as a conduit and he was really playing at all. Lora would look at Luiz as if for approval; Luiz would turn a soft interlude into a rock riff, smile at everyone with extremely self-satisfied humor and then return to his stoicism. It was simultaneously bizarre, wonderful and aurally awesome, and a visual treat to boot, to see two virtuosos playing, well, anything. If I were them, I would take out some insurance on those thumbnails. This isn't even my genre, really, and I was quite impressed. B+

Setlist:

Gavotte & Variations - Jean Phillipe Rameau
Four Preludes and Fugues, Op. 199 - Mario Castelnuevo-Tedesco
Waltz, Prelude - Douglas Lora Las Casas
Vasu Brasileira, Cordao De Saideira, Zanzibar - Edu Lobo
Don Quixote, Sete Anais - Egberto Gismonti
Bom Partido - Paulo Bellinati

Encore:
Some cool samba song