Maurizio changed my musical life, 35 years ago... a record - Window over the Stream - and a single piece - Out of the Game - were enough to make me sick about 12 strings acoustic guitar... forever.
Maurizio's records reviews on L'Ultimo Buscadero magazine about Robbie Basho, John Fahey, Peter Lang, Daniel Hecht, Alex De Grassi, William Ackerman and other superb guitar players opened my eyes and ears, further and further.
These records were quite difficult to be found at your local records store, so Carù Dischi in Gallarate and its mail service were extremely useful in these pre-WEB days.
Same as with analog photography, from ordering by phone to get the disc a couple of weeks were the norm... and the pleasure, after the wait, like looking at the pictures shot weeks before, was huge!
Maurizio wrote a seminal book, American Guitar, about his and my own heroes, not copy-catting infos around but visiting all of them, at their places, in the USA...
The effect of Maurizio Angeletti on me (and many other musicians friends I'm aware of) was incredible and, in 1983, I simply had to know him in person...
... same as when I spent three hours with the late Davey Graham in Camden Town, London or when I visited John Renbourn in Kingswear, Devon... it wasn't so difficult... a phone call and this alone usually worked!
... same happened with Maurizio... I arranged to take some lessons from him, at his house in Milan...
Every Saturday, for some months, I took my train bound to Milan with a cheap Ibanez jumbo to reach Maurizio and he shared licks and expression chatting and... I was like a sponge.
...
35 years after, I got an email from Maurizio, himself... out of the blue.
Wham!
I wasn't 100% sure he remembered our previous, so far away connection... yet... Maurizio was announcing around the freshly issued 2-volumes book about his findings and thoughts on the weird, unique, difficult, seldom found 12 strings acoustic guitar... not a louder 6 strings guitar or an harpsichord, but as he wisely wrote in his foreword, a one of a kind, well-defined instrument.
I immediately ordered my copy which arrived in a few hours... it really was my perfect birthday present, which I gladly paid for, of course.
The book - in Italian only, but full of diagrams, TABs, pictures - is made of a thicker tome of 450+ pages of technical, musical and aesthetic in-deep and well-informed prose with its highlights about composing and interpretations and playing dynamics and a spiral-bound TABs only book of 30 transcriptions for 12 strings acoustic guitar, all arranged or composed by Maurizio, himself.
A goldmine more than a book... it will give - to me and to everyone into this elusive, yet wonderful world of the mighty 12 strings guitar - many years of enjoyment and musical pleasure.
The one of a kind Marco Cavedon 12 strings acoustic guitar used by Maurizio in early '80s.
Please, if interested, drop Maurizio himself a note at mangeletti12corde-AT-gmai-DOT-com
A quite recent pix of the Author.
You won't regret doing so and spending every single cent of the price-tag of this opus magna.
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