October 17, 2003
By Lucille Davie
THERE'RE few musicians that put my brain in that place. Sibongile Khumalo's one. The Aquarian Quartet is quite firmly another.
"That place" is a sense of tremendous well-being, extreme euphoria and a severe case of contentment. The Quartet and their seven guest performers brought on these emotions in The World in a Guitar on at the Market Theatre for the next two weeks.
The Quartet consists of four master acoustic guitar players - Tony Cox, Steve Newman, Syd Kitchen (guitar plus pipe and vocals), and Greg Georgiades (guitar plus oud and bouzouki). The oud is an ancient Arabic guitar, the forerunner of today's acoustic guitar, and the bouzouki is a Greek guitar.
The Quartet were joined on stage by four of the country's best guitarists: Errol Dyers, Saudiq Khan (Flamenco guitar), Edi Niederlander and Madala Kunene. In addition, Kesivan Naidoo was on drums, Ashish Joshi on tabla (an Arabic double drum that rests on the floor), and Anton Cawthorn-Blazeby on violin. Violinist Terrence Scarr will replace Cawthorn-Blazeby from 17 October.
The music these musicians produced was almost primeval - it had trance-like qualities, hence the feeling of contentment. The musicians enticed beautiful, stirring, unusual sounds out of their instruments, a sign of their supreme skill.
Cox was the mastermind behind bringing the superb group together for this show, which had its debut in Cape Town earlier this year.
He says: "The show is a musical extrapolation from The Aquarian Quartet to many of the exceptional musicians they have worked with over the years, and brings together the stunning fret-board wizardry of our country's finest guitarists and acoustic musicians."
After their run in Joburg, they'll be touring nationally over the next four months.
Most of them have played together in different settings, and that gives them a major advantage - they are in tune and in touch with one another's talents, sharing their passion. In fact, the Quartet are all aquarians, hence the name.
All of them are established in their fields, having collectively produced dozens of albums. The Quartet released a CD, entitled Live, in 2000, and the Johannesburg show will be recorded and available in music stores in December. A DVD is also to be recorded.
It's almost impossible to say one piece was better than another but some did stand out: Newman's Cucaracha Nuevo was extraordinary, as was Khan's Andaluz. Newman's and Cox's duos were breathtaking, in particular the Duelling Zorbas.
And the finale, well, the finale was just awesome, with eight guitarists sitting in a row across the stage, accompanied by their percussion colleagues, playing their instruments, sharing their talent, their mastery, offering a glimpse into their souls. They played Georgiades' creation, Goemma Non-Data, for what seemed like 10 minutes.
They could have played it for 10 hours, I wouldn't have minded.
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