Artist Interview: Beppe Gambetta

by Stephen Rekas

It was my pleasure to interview Italian flatpicking guitarist Beppe Gambetta just prior to his September 29 premiere performance at the Focal Point, a long-standing acoustic listening room in the St. Louis suburb of Maplewood, Missouri.

In the interview, Beppe speaks at length and with great passion and enthusiasm of his journey as a guitarist, including his profound respect for his early influences, Doc Watson and Norman Blake, whose solos he diligently transcribed as a self-taught guitar student. As you'll hear in the interview, he then took that knowledge steps ahead, through further musicological research and his own compositions and technical advances, to a higher musical plane. He now plays the broadest repertoire of any flatpicking guitarist I've heard, including Celtic, North American, Italian, Spanish, and Sicilian influences in his sets and recordings.

On camera, as his audience was already lining up outside the door to the Focal Point and time was an issue, I regrettably omitted one question from my interview with Beppe. Earlier, however, my friend (and videographer for this interview) Janet Marlow had inquired:

"Tell me about the guitar you are playing."

"This is one of the new hand-made Taylors," he said, gripping the body with both hands and displaying it to her best visual advantage. "These are really nice."

Beppe's performance at the Focal Point was flawless and thoroughly entertaining. He draws upon all of his resources, including cross and sweep picking, alternate tunings, original and traditional melodies, Celtic and Sicilian triplets, and vocals in English and Italian. Although graciously tinged with a light Italian accent, his jokes also hit the mark:

What does a banjo have in common with a hand grenade?

By the time you hear them, it is already too late.

He even remembered to thank the sound man, and the Focal Point artistic director, Judy Stein.

The near capacity crowd at Focal Point - which included Focal Point regulars, several Mel Bay employees, and my wife and children- loved him! Following his performance, Beppe gave the pick he had used that evening to my daughter to use on her uke. "I love giving my picks to children," Beppe explained. "Sometimes when I see them again, I learn that they have actually used them."

I hope you enjoy my video interview with a true artist and dedicated student of the flatpicking guitar. Better yet, you can still hear Beppe Gambetta on his 2007 North America tour through October 14. Check out his website for concert locations: www.beppegambetta.com/

Best wishes,
Stephen Rekas
Guitar Sessions Editor

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