Guitar maestro branches out from layered sound

Few musicians can claim to have created a genre, but guitarist Ottmar Liebert certainly did with his 1990 album Nouveau Flamenco. Liebert's hybrid style - somewhere between Spanish passion, classical melodicism and mellow New Age music - spawned innumerable imitators and ensured this affable Santa Fe-based musician a long career.

In fact Liebert has released 22 albums since Nouveau Flamenco, the biggest-selling guitar album of all time.

He has branched into albums of remixes, sells his music through his website, and lives a leisurely life playing about 10 shows a month.

Surprisingly, Liebert hasn't undertaken a major international touring schedule for many years, and his return to New Zealand this month is one of the few times he has been outside the United States since he was last here in 1999.

Once again he is touring with his Luna Negra band but says he has been exploring solo shows lately. For a man who prefers the quiet life at home with his family this solo work has re-invigorated him.

"I'd always done music which was layered and thought out, and this is the opposite. I started doing it for myself and I'd record a piece - about 70 per cent is improvised - and I'd put them in the download store on our website. They were received well, and people wanted to get the music on CD - so I've now got an album of solo work, One Guitar, coming out.

"Interestingly, Nouveau Flamenco which started all this hoopla, was just done for myself as well. That's a good place to be in as an artist. Music shouldn't be there to sell or be a hit, it should be there for its own sake."

Liebert's career took off in a way that has some parallels in this age of the internet when musicians find their audience through direct contact rather than major record companies.

He recorded some instrumental tracks with his band, a Santa Fe artist liked what he heard and distributed the music through local galleries, a radio station played some of the tunes, a small label picked up the album and started regional distribution, and finally Sony jumped on board.

These days Liebert maintains much the same pace and structure in his career and lifestyle: "Taking two hours for lunch with a friend is for me a good day; it's about taking the time."

He records at his home studio and spends much of his day reading - his conversation includes references to American Zen poet Gary Snyder, sci-fi writers, architects and philosophers - or looking after his kids.

Forty of his photos on his website have been licensed to various tourism boards and city guides in Rome, Austin and Santa Fe, thus doing stock photographers out of a living.

But he has strong opinions about what has happened to the appreciation of music in the past few decades.

"Music has been diminished. Round here if you gas up your car there is a speaker blaring out country and western.

"The guitarist Robert Fripp calls [these speakers] noise pollution units, and I remember reading about the German band Kraftwerk who had nail clippers with them and would clip any exposed speaker wire.

"We are being desensitised to music. Most of the information we assimilate is taken in visually, we don't listen to story tellers or have an oral exchange of information much.".


On stage

* Who: Ottmar Liebert and Luna Negra

* Where and when: Auckland Town Hall, Thursday July 27