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MILOŠ KARADAGLIĆ,
guitar
Born in Montenegro in
, Miloš Karadaglić
rst started playing the guitar at the age of , and
at he earned a scholarship to study at London’s
Royal Academy of Music. He quickly gained in-
ternational attention with the release of his
debut album on Deutsche Grammophon,
Medi-
terráneo
, which featured works by Albéniz, Tar-
rega, Granados, Carlo Domeniconi, and Mikis
eodorakis,
e recording topped classical
charts around the world, and Karadaglić was
immediately recognized by
Gramophone
as its
Young Artist of the Year. His next album,
’s
Latino
, mixed works by Piazzolla and Villa-Lo-
bos with other Spanish and Latin compositions,
and that same year Karadaglić was the subject of
the internationally broadcast documentary
Mi-
loš: Heartstrings
, which traced his background
and career. In addition to such major classical
theaters as Royal Albert Hall, where he earned
no uncertain praise from the London press in his
debut, Karadaglić o en plays small or non-tra-
ditional spaces where he can host intimate
chamber music programs. He has been featured
on Deutsche Grammophon’s Yellow Lounge
club series in London, Berlin, Amsterdam, Ma-
drid, New York, and Seoul, and he has also per-
formed at such venues as New York’s Le Poisson
Rouge, London’s Camden Roundhouse (for the
iTunes Festival), Paris’s Café de la Dance, and
Berlin’s Berghein. Following the release of his
third album,
Aranjuez
, in
, Karadaglić made
debuts with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra,
Los Angeles Philharmonic, and Cleveland and
Philadelphia Orchestras; he has also been a fea-
tured guest of the Spanish National Orchestra,
Italy’s Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di
Santa Cecilia, and the Czech, Oslo, London, and
Munich Philharmonics, as well as the Gstaad,
Verbier, and Rheingau Festivals. In
, he was
named a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music.
Karadaglić subsequently collaborated with sing-
ers Gregory Porter and Tori Amos, cellist Steven
Isserlis, and sitarist Anoushka Shankar on an
album of Beatles covers for the Mercury label,
Blackbird
, which was released in
. Miloš
Karadaglić made his simultaneous Ravinia and
CSO debuts in
, and tonight he makes his
rst return to the festival.
group progressed from an exciting live act to
progressive studio artists employing advanced
recording techniques and sophisticated scor-
ings, sometimes including orchestral strings.
e album
Revolver
(
) was e Beatles’ last
before their nal move from stage to studio. “El-
eanor Rigby” appeared on Side One, the second
track a er “Taxman.” An ode to the lonely and
abandoned, it tells the story of a poor spinster
named Eleanor Rigby, a character perhaps in-
spired by the name on a gravestone in the cem-
etery of Liverpool’s St. Peter’s Church where
John Lennon and Paul McCartney met, and
an ine ective priest named Father McKenzie,
originally named Father McCartney. ese two
lonely souls meet when Father McKenzie deliv-
ers the eulogy at Eleanor Rigby’s funeral, too late
for both (“No one was saved”). Paul McCartney
composed the music and provided lead vocals
while members of the band contributed lyr-
ics and vocal harmonies above a double string
quartet.
Paul McCartney composed the music and lyrics
to “ e Fool on the Hill” as an o and tribute to
the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the creator of Tran-
scendental meditation sometimes called the
“Giggling Guru” and a “fool” for his high-pitch
laughing during television interviews. McCart-
ney rst sang the tune for the group while play-
ing guitar, with partial lyrics and la-la-la’s where
he was not yet nished, on March ,
. e
Beatles included “ e Fool on the Hill” on its
Magical Mystery Tour
album and lm (
).
e song enjoyed continued success the follow-
ing year when Sérgio Mendes & Brasil ’ issued
its bossa nova version with lead vocals by Chica-
go native Lani Hall and Karen Philipp.
Although the album
Let It Be
was the last re-
leased by
e Beatles in
, their actual nal
recording project was
Abbey Road
(
).
e
group continued its sound exploration through
the introduction of distortions and e ects avail-
able on the Moog synthesizer and Leslie speak-
ers. George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun,”
which appeared as the lead track on Side Two,
drew inspiration from the peaceful garden at
Eric Clapton’s country home in Surrey, where
Harrison had taken refuge from the high-ten-
sion business a airs of e Beatles. ose stress-
es spilled over into the
Abbey Road
recording
sessions and ultimately led to the band’s breakup
in
.
CARLO DOMENICONI (b. 1947)
Koyunbaba
Italian-born guitarist Carlo Domeniconi taught
at the Istanbul Conservatory in Turkey as its rst
professor of guitar between
and
. Many
of his later works re ect his contact with Turkish
music. e word
koyunbaba
bears three distinct
meanings: a watchful shepherd (
koyun
means
“sheep,” and
baba
means “father”), a th-centu-
ry mystic saint, and a region in southwest Tur-
key inhabited by Koyunbaba’s descendants.
Domeniconi remembered this area as being
cursed. Anyone desiring to rent or purchase
land from the Koyunbaba family either became
seriously ill or died. Domeniconi requires a spe-
cial tuning of the guitar—the strings are tuned
to C-sharp minor—that provides an exotic
modal, Moorish quality.
–Program notes ©
Todd E. Sullivan
Abbey Road
cover (1969)
Carlo Domeniconi
(photo: Brigitte Zaczeck)
AUGUST 20 – AUGUST 26, 2018 | RAVINIA MAGAZINE
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