Harp Guitar Concert – Music & Myth with Jonathan Pickard – Fri 9th Jun

Doors 7.30pm. Start 8pm. Tickets £12 online, £15 OTD.

Prepared to be astounded at CICCIC’s Concerts with this exclusive concert with the amazing talents of Jon Pickard, who will delight you with a truly unique musical experience and storytelling performance with the rarest of all guitars – an amazing and very rare instrument – the 23 string ‘Harp Guitar.’ This wonderful instrument has to be seen (and heard) to be believed!

“A rare musical treat… a consummate musician…a sensitive and versatile player.” Buxton Fringe

Jon’s mesmerising guitar skills, creative musical imagination and multi-genre approach spanning folk, fingerstyle and classical guitar styles are enough by themselves to thrill any audience. Add to that these incredible rare instruments each with its own unique soundscape, the vision and stories that accompany each work, the video backdrops, the intimate and down to earth delivery of the whole award winning show – the reasons to see this go on and on.

A fascinating visual presentation – “The Hidden History of the Harp-Guitar” will take you through over 350 years of this incredible instrument’s history and evolution from the earliest examples through to the present day.

The following concert performance titled “Music & Myth” will feature spoken folk tales from the Celtic Isles and beyond with music written specifically for Harp-Guitar, inspired by these timeless ancient legends. accompanied by beautiful video backdrop imagery.

“Beautiful, atmospheric….profoundly emotional and spiritual…You want to close your eyes and let the pictures created by the musician take you” The Fine Times Recorder

Multi-stringed Harp Guitars have been around for much longer than 6 string guitars, and have a rich and varied (but elusive) history all across the globe. They have a sound all of their own – bigger, richer and more resonant than any ‘normal’ acoustic guitar – and a wider range with extra ‘sub-bass’ and ‘super-treble’ string banks.

“The ability of the instrument to teleport the listener is breath-taking” BritishTheatre.com

About Jon

Jonathan Pickard is a professional Guitarist and Pianist, specialising in performances for concerts and all live events. He has done this for over 25 years. He developed a busy career specializing in Classical, Spanish, Flamenco and Latin Guitar styles but is also known for his many arrangements of modern Pop tunes for the 6 string guitar.

More recently Jon discovered Harp Guitars, designed and commissioned 3 very different 23 stringed versions of them – each with their own unique sound qualities. This opened the floodgates to his creativity and he now composes and shares with audiences his own original music, plays other Harp Guitar composers’ works, and arranges other music for Harp Guitar. All this is combined with his passion for film making / visual imagery and story telling.

Jon has also studied and played Jazz piano professionally for around 30 years. He is based in Somerset from where he teaches music and performs across the country.
More info at www.jonpickard.co.uk