Sor's Method for the Spanish Guitar (Dover Books on Music)

Known as "the Beethoven of the guitar," the nineteenth-century composer Ferdinand Sor (1778–1839) is acclaimed for his many etudes, fantasies, and minuets, which form the cornerstone of the instrument's literature and systematize its technical and expressive resources.
Suitable for players at every level, this manual concisely illustrates every aspect of interpretation with text, diagrams, and music. It presents a complete review of the principles of tone production and fingering, with respect to intervals of thirds and sixths, phrasing of melody, and special problems of right-hand articulation and harmonics. Sor takes a contrarian stance in his view of accompaniment as an important and difficult art, modeled after the piano and orchestra and requiring well-constructed bass lines. In this vein, he analyzes the accompaniment of Haydn's oratorio The Creation with a complete musical excerpt. Other featured pieces include "Là ci darem a la mano" from Mozart's Don Giovanni, a romance by Cherubini, and an air by Paisiello, in addition to numerous exercises.