Tommy Emmanuel
Endless Road

The first time I saw him perform live, I was struck by the way he worked with harmonics. It all happened in a flash, he captivated me at first sight, I didn't know whether to watch his hands or listen to what he was doing (very difficult to do both when you have an "alien" of this caliber in front of you).

The music was sweet and harmoniously tailored, it was a tune I had heard many times before but couldn't remember where, I couldn't focus on it, the work he was doing with that guitar impressed me. Then the glimmer grew larger, clearer, and finally, that title came to my mouth, but it came out so clearly that I spat it out too loudly to the point where many turned to look at me... “Il Carnevale di Venezia”. Seven years have passed since then, and I have seen him live two more times, don't hold it against me if I now tell you that this comes from another planet, but it's the first thought that flashes through your mind when you see him pick up that damn guitar for the first time. A real hero of the six strings, the Australian Tommy Emmanuel with a fingerpicking mania, starts playing at a tender age (4 years old), he makes his way on his own, self-taught, from a young age listening to lots of music, particularly consuming the records of Django Reinhardt, Wes Montgomery, Steve Ray Vaughan, Chet Atkins, and in no time, he achieves great success, in Australia he is practically an idol (winning also many gold records) arousing interest on a large part of the planet. We find him on many stages, his versatility is worthy of applause, kind and affable with the audience, he always reserves a smile for you, he dialogues during concerts, cracks jokes, and plays with the guitar like no one else can.

“Endless Road” is proof of it, an entirely acoustic guitar album (I recommend it to all metal six-string lovers) the artist moves with great ease across all genres with impressive ease, technique, speed, and improvisation blend into the structure of the pieces almost perfectly, the execution leaves no escape and the listening experience is left to enjoy the impact with these sounds perfectly placed one after another in a sequence that oscillates between classical, jazz, contemporary music, folk, country, blues. It reveals the maturity of the artist but above all the versatility in interpreting music, the 17 tracks that make up the album are a real balance between accelerations, sharp turns, and turbulent crashes never lacking in those feats of magic, that only a talented person like him can pull out of the hat.

Sifting through the tracks, “Morning Aire” beautiful, sweet, and graceful, “Angelina” for the finger-style technique that dominates the piece, are extremely delightful, “Son Of A Gun” and “Sanitarium Shuffle” here too the artist's blues roots are very much felt, “Bella Soave” dedicated to the splendid town in Verona where the collectible guitar event is held once a year (Tommy is present almost every year), and still two pearls sung by himself “I Still Can't Say Goodbye” a very sad song written by Jimmy Moore and “Today Is Mine” by Jerry Reed (note on this latter the great a cappella singing work). I'll let you discover the other “airs” of the album, telling you that you won't be disappointed. Perhaps in this review, I idolized him a bit, but it's worth listening to him.

Instead for those lucky enough to see him live, well what can I say... don't wait for him from behind the stage, but look up... he'll come from the sky.

Good music to all.