Sean Hickey profile

Tango Grotesco

Form
Solo
Instrumentation
guitar
Year
2001
Duration
5:00
Premiere
FP: 6/01, Jack DeSalvo, Brooklyn, New York
Description

Tango for solo guitar, with performances on three continents, this is one of my most performed works.

Score
Program Notes

Tango Grotesco was premiered in 2001 and is my only work for solo guitar. Despite my familiarity with the instrument, I find it to be the most intimidating to write for. The piece has benefited from the tremendous advocacy of one of the great champions of new music for the guitar, Oren Fader, who performed it on Left at the Fork in the Road, on Naxos. Lyrical passages and intricate passagework alternate with heavily-strummed chordal sections that suggest the characteristic rhythms of the tango - a humble example of one of my greatest fascinations: the music of Latin America. The work has since been performed on three continents.

News

Recordings

El Aleph cover
Left at the Fork in the Road album cover