Brian Smith, left, Kyle Dawkins, Phil Snyder and Jason Solomon of the Georgia Guitar Quartet,...

If there is anything better than listening to a sweetly plucked guitar while watching the sun sink behind Park City's mountains, perhaps it is listening to four of them at once.

By Celia R. Baker
Special to The Tribune

 Listeners will have that opportunity this week when the Georgia Guitar Quartet plays in St. Mary's Church of Park City as part of the Deer Valley Music Festival.

 Last summer, DVMF hosted the quartet on a Utah Symphony Chamber Series concert - with a mountain sunset, thanks to St. Mary's glass walls. The evening was a success, and the four guitarists were invited back. But this time, they'll have the whole concert to themselves as part of the Guest Chamber Artists Series.

 "We were so impressed with the beauty of Park City, Salt Lake City and Utah in general," said guitarist Jason Solomon. "It's hard to be there and not be inspired. We're looking forward to getting back to that environment."

 The members of the Georgia Guitar Quartet - Solomon, Kyle Dawkins, Brian Smith and Phil Snyder - met while studying classical guitar at the University of Georgia with master teacher John Sutherland.

 "[Sutherland] coached us a lot during our formative years and the early part of our career," Solomon said. "He's one of those people - part musician, part psychologist - who could see that we could click on a musical level and work well together."

 The group has been performing together for 11 years with no changes in personnel, a track record considered a rarity among chamber groups. "We're best friends," Solomon said. "It's great to travel around together, because we have a good time hanging out together even if it's not related to music. We actually enjoy each other's company."

 In Utah, the group will play a wide-ranging program that includes Renaissance dances by Michael Praetorius, a light-hearted Baroque fugue by Domenico Scarlatti, Spanish-flavored music by Federico Moreno Torroba and Vince Guaraldi's "Linus and Lucy."

 The program also includes contemporary works written for the group by two of its members, and Suite for Four Guitars, composed for the quartet by Russian guitarist-composer Nikita Koshkin.

 "One of our goals is to break down walls and misconceptions about classical music, or any style of music," Solomon said. "There are various ways music is categorized, and those barriers are kind of artificial. We try to present programs that have all kinds of different styles."
 The piece Dawkins wrote for the quartet, "Two Repaired Movements," sounds like a rock song, revealing influences such as Radiohead and Tool.

 "We don't like to be pigeonholed, and we're open to just about anything," Solomon said. "If it sounds good, if it works and if it's something we all believe in, we're going to play it."

 Solomon said the guitar's ability to produce a variety of tonal colors makes it possible to orchestrate arrangements with interesting musical contrasts. Different ways of plucking or strumming the strings affect the sound produced, as does playing closer to the bridge.

 Piano music is often the basis for guitar quartet transcriptions, because of inherent similarities between the sounds the two instruments produce. "After you hear the note, it begins to fade away," Solomon said. "It won't sustain like the human voice, or a bowed or wind instrument."

 Piano composers write with that type of sound in mind, meaning a piece such as Chopin's Etude Op. 10 No. 3 transfers well when its technical demands are divided among four guitarists.

To hear an example, visit www.utahsymphony.org/concert-detail.php?id=135.

 "I don't feel anything was lost in translation when the piece was transferred to guitars," Solomon said. "Being able to play that beautiful melody with a little vibrato arguably enhances it. It's a different way to experience the piece."

 Solomon and his colleagues prefer to play their classical guitars without amplification. "The guitar is a very quiet instrument," Solomon said, "so we're dependent on playing in a room that has nice acoustics. St. Mary's has beautiful acoustics."

 Carolyn Fouse, parish secretary for the church, agrees that St. Mary's is a great setting for chamber music. "Here at St. Mary's, if you look out the windows, you're looking at the mountains," Fouse said. "It always seems to fit with the music that's played here."

 Georgia on my mind
 

   The Utah Symphony presents the Georgia Guitar Quartet as part of the Deer Valley Music Festival on Aug. 7 at 8 p.m. at St. Mary's Church, 1505 White Pine Canyon Road, Park City. Tickets $25; $12 for students; $5 more on the day of the concert. Call 801-355-ARTS, or visit www.deervalleymusicfestival.org or www.arttix.org.

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