The temps around showtime Saturday evening sat stubbornly in the 30s, the literal icing on a grey day steeped in a final chorus of winter. But inside, as the California Guitar Trio took to the intimate loft confines of b-side at Decade in Louisville, a profound sign of spring bloomed.
Situated squarely in the middle of the progressive instrumental ensemble’s first Kentucky concert in five years was a colorful reimagining of “God Only Knows,” perhaps the greatest love song Brian Wilson penned for the Beach Boys. As is the want of the CGT, its approach to interpretation was quite faithful to the tune’s original design, but also more than a little crafty in the manner with which it was dispatched. Paul Richards’ slide guitar, for instance, mimicked the song’s introductory round of French horns. Co-founding guitarist Bert Lams then transposed the vocal melody into an expressive instrumental voice while Chapman Stick stylist Tom Griesgraber constructed an economical but resourceful foundation through variations of the tune’s orchestral grace and tricky shifts of tempo. Mostly though, the reworking simply possessed a sense of warmth – yes, spring-like warmth – that has always sat at the heart of the trio’s stylistically far-reaching repertoire.
The CGT has been a professional touring unit for over three decades and a welcome visitor to Louisville and Lexington venues for two. Saturday’s performance was its first Kentucky outing with a retuned lineup and sound. With co-founding member Hideyo Moriya having relocated back to his native Japan, long time CGT ally Griesgraber stepped in. That altered what had been a makeup of three acoustic guitars, albeit a design that never shied away from tone-shifting pedal effects that gave the band a broad musical palette to play with. But with a fully electric instrument now in the mix (the Chapman Stick is 12-string guitar offshoot that triggers both guitar and bass sounds through tapping), Richards and Lams have responded by playing hybrid guitars with electric and acoustic pickups that fall nicely in line with the Stick’s sonic reach.
In some ways that meant this was more of a plugged-in version of the CGT, although the dance-like delicacy of notes that showered from the show-opening “Flickering Lights” and the later melancholy of “Hallistussilmad” revealed the still-organic breadth of acoustic music. The electric accents simply heightened an already adventurous musical spirit.
Of course, the group’s magic has long been an ability to blend such instrumental mischief with a repertoire broad enough to fully ignite those possibilities. On that score, the Saturday performance did not disappoint.
The original works shifted from the faux Celtic fancy of “The Irish Ditty” (which, along “Flickering Lights,” was among several new unrecorded pieces in the set) to the soft-glow requiem of “Eve” and the cinematic expansiveness of “Punta Patri” (both longstanding CGT performance pieces).
The interpretations were, per usual, as wild in their choice of inclusion and they were in execution. A medley that paired the Tomaso Albinoni associated “Adagio in G Minor” with Ennio Morricone’s theme from “The Good, The Band and The Ugly” became a centuries-spanning Italian adventure while a set-closing take on Pink Floyd’s “Echoes” used the trio’s newly expanded electric vocabulary to further heighten the work’s inherent trippiness.
The performance concluded with “Bohemian Rhapsody.” The CGT has for years employed it as a means of audience involvement, pairing an anticipated sing-a-long as a safety net for a high-wire act that deconstructed the Queen classic into a daring, acoustic-rich instrumental joyride.
Saturday’s audience chose to listen more than sing, which was fine. That signaled a whole other level of involvement. Though it may not have been in especially bold voice, the Louisville crowd was very much all ears.
The Musical Box 