Long Distance
Liner Notes   Cat. No. NWCR697     Release Date: 1995-01-01
Seth Josel, guitar

Every composer, every listener to music—intent or casual— has to come to terms with the guitar. As the sonic flesh of Western popular music for much of the last half century, it is simply inescapable: there are few places left so remote that the sound of the guitar is unknown or shut out.

Given its ubiquity, though, the guitar is an instrument of surprisingly few, if powerful, associations. Amplified at great volume, it is rock’s instrument of potency and persuasion, of sex and rebellion; it cries tears and comforts the lonely in country and western music; it is a gentle accompanist and social unifier in folk music; it is a symbol of Spain. In classical music, the guitar’s ancestor, the lute, was widely used in the Renaissance and Baroque periods, but since then, outside of Spain, it has been a minor player. In our century, the modernist school of composers has acknowledged it but not its associations, finding in it, instead, a vast potential for color and variety of sounds—an approach that has had little popularity outside of a specialized audience.

Yet the tension created by the guitar’s unavoidable historical and ethnic associations, its present-day ubiquity, and its ability to continually renew itself happen to make it an ideal vehicle for musical postmodernism—the instrument, that is, for out times. Consequently, the music performed by Seth Josel herein, which is centered around the culturally unstable 1980s and 1990s, turns out to be a kind of wide-lens snapshot of our musical era that would be hard to match in a collection of new works for any other single instrument.


This title, originally issued on the CRI label, is now available as a burn-on-demand CD (CD-R) or download in MP3/320, FLAC or WAV formats. CD-Rs come in a protective sleeve; no print booklet or jewel case included. Liner notes are accessible via the link above.t(s).

Seth Josel

Long Distance

MP3/320 $9.99
FLAC $9.99
WAV $9.99
CD-R $9.99
CD-Rs come in a protective sleeve; no print material or jewel case included.
A *.pdf of the notes may be accessed here free of charge.
   Liner Notes



Track Listing

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Arien IV, Solo Music for Guitar: II. Meditation
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Arien IV, Solo Music for Guitar: III. Tarantella
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Arien IV, Solo Music for Guitar: IV. Discant
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Arien IV, Solo Music for Guitar: V. Ricercar
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Water on The Mountain...Fire in Heaven: Section B
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Water on The Mountain...Fire in Heaven: Section C
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Bag O' Tells: II. Mbira
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Bag O' Tells: III. Canzona
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Bag O' Tells: IV. La Bamba
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Greaseball
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Ciacona
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