What Makes a Classical Guitar Different to Other Types of Guitar?

When you think of guitars, many people immediately think about one of two types - either the popular electric guitar used so prevalently by bands and groups that produce popular music, and the classical guitars more traditionally used for softer music, and classical music itself. The one distinctive attribute of a classical guitar is its ability to allow the musician to construct and play arrangements of music with multiple notes being played simultaneously, what is known as polyphonic music, and this is similar is in many respects to the traditional pianoforte.

This ability to play polyphonic music is the one aspect above all others that sets the classical guitar aside from other types, including the popular acoustic guitar, bass guitars and the electric guitars, which are more limited in the notes and combinations which can be played. Although often it may be suggested that classical guitars are not the only type to be capable of this polyphonic sound, and that flamenco guitars offer the same opportunity, there is still one great difference that sets the two types of guitar aside. Classical guitars, as with most guitars, are designed to be plucked or strummed, whereas flamenco guitars are far more percussive, being played almost as though in the style of a piano, with the strings being struck or hit to create the resonating note, and this difference in playing method creates a very significant difference in the type of sound or voice, and the style of music that each instrument is capable of producing.

The classical guitar that we tend to think of has a broad family, and across the whole world the classical guitar comes in many flavours, each sharing the same quality and characteristic of being able to play polyphonic musical arrangements, but each lending the music a distinctive quality which reflects the different musical traditions and patterns of the culture of each country. For example, a wide range of guitars can be found in Mexico, with the very small guitar known as the requinto, and then the much larger guitarron which is so much larger that it competes with a cello for size, and therefore produces a much more deeply resonating sound, and is tuned to the same register as a bass guitar.

A similar range of different sizes and styles can be seen in Columbia too, with the smallest guitar being known as the bandola, and is most popularly used as a travelling guitar, since its small size allows it to be packed or carried with relatively little difficulty. A slightly larger version of the classical guitar than the bandola is the tiple, and this is mid way between the bandola and the classical guitar, although he classical guitar does itself appear in the Columbian repertoire. The classical guitar, or as they are often referred to today, the classic guitar, owes its shape and traditionally agreed dimensions to a man named Antonio Torres Jurado who lived from 1817 to 1892.

Today the modern classic guitar has ten strings, which is four more than a traditional guitar with only six. These four extra strings, called resonators, are tuned in a very special way that means that they can be played, and will resonate in tune to any of the twelve notes that can be played chromatically on the higher strings. The three bass strings on a classic ten string guitar are tuned in the same way, and this extra tuning for resonance is felt to improve and complement the sonority of the sound, giving a much more distinctive, clear and full performance of the music. Modern classic guitars are available in a number of different versions which can be played within different octaves, with the soprano guitar being used to play a full octave higher than a normal guitar, and a contrabass guitar achieving notes a full octave lower.

Classical Crossover Music - History and Growing Popularity

Over the years, certain classical music works have gained popularity amongst pop music fans, thereby achieving crossover status. Some of these classical music pieces include the Symphony No. 3 by Henryk Górecki, Canon in D by Johann Pachelbel, and the second movement of Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 21, K. 467 from its appearance in the 1967 film Elvira Madigan.

Classical Crossover is used to refer to classical artists' recordings of popular repertoire including the Broadway show tunes, as well as collaborations between pop music artists and classical music performers. A good example that fits this definition is the album songs from the Labyrinth, by Sting and Edin Karamazov. An earlier example of classical crossover music is Deep Purple's 1969 album - Concerto for Group and Orchestra, while a recent example is Metallica's 1999 album S&M.

The most popular vocal classical crossover artist is Mario Lanza, the American tenor and movie star who was popular in the 1950s, whose amazing voice caught the attention of even those who were not die-hard classical music fans. Lanza was signed as an artist to RCA Victor on its premium label - Red Seal. One of his most amazing musical feats was his recording of Be My Love, from The Toast of New Orleans, his second film, which hit Number One on the Billboard pop singles chart in February 1951 and sold more than 2-million copies. To-date, no classical label artist, including The Three Tenors, has been able to match this achievement.

However, the beginning of classical crossover as a truly popular form of music is credited to the famous "three tenors" Pavarotti, Careras, and Domingo. During their tours, these three top opera singers presented a mixture of operatic and popular material to huge crowds, which resulted in the production of enormously successful albums.

In recent years classical crossover has come into its own as a genre of music due to the commercial successes of artist such as Yo-Yo Ma and Josh Groban. Through the infusion of elements of pop, rock and influences such as African chants, Appalachian folk tunes and Nordic fishing songs, these musicians bring a new dimension to classical music.

An example of a successful classical crossover group is Il Divo, a creation of Simon Cowell of "American Idol" fame. According to Billboard magazine, the group's debut album has sold nearly five million copies, and over a million in the United States. Il Divo offers angelic operatic renditions of pop songs, which have been successful on Billboard's classical crossover chart. Their style is mainly referred to as "Popera" (Pop + opera) which refers to the singing of opera material in a popularized, but still operatic style. Some members of Il Divo have had operatic training and are able to sing many arias and other classical material using an operatic style of singing.

Singers such as the English soprano Sarah Brightman, Charlotte Church, and self-taught Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli also offer renditions of classical works. The fact that these are done by popular singers has also helped transform classical crossover into a popular genre of its own.

To reciprocate the entry of popular singers covering operatic and classical material, trained opera singers, such as Natasha Marsh, Bryn Terfel and Vittorio Grigolo have also produced classical crossover albums hoping to cash in on this genre's popularity.

Today, Classical crossover music is generally appealing to a bigger segment of the population, although purists criticize it as being an inferior, diluted version of real classical music. Nevertheless, the increasing popularity of this genre has resulted in more young people gaining interest in classical music enough to take up violin lessons or even lessons in opera singing. This has also been fuelled by the glossy, sexy marketing of most of the successful crossover artists that has transformed them into modern day pop stars.