Online Guitar Lessons with Totally Guitars
One of the most recognized classical guitar pieces of the last 50 years, Cavatina started out as a short piano piece by English composer Stanley Myers. In 1970 John Williams encouraged Stanley to stretch it out and they put together an orchestra version with two guitars. It was first recorded for Williams’ 1971 album, Changes, and was used as a theme in the movie The Walking Stick in 1970. The movie The Deer Hunter then used the song as its main theme in 1978, launching the piece into the mainstream. Almost every classical guitar player since then has worked on playing the solo version, mostly as arranged and performed by John Williams.
After unexplainedly neglecting this beautiful piece for all these years, I finally figured I should put together a lesson on it for Totally Guitars. With some assistance and advice from my old friend John Dimick, I took most of John Williams’ fingerings and changed or modified a few for various reasons that I go into in the lesson.
Here is what I really consider a rough draft of Cavatina as I am still exploring fingering options and overall tone and continuity. I have a feeling this will always somewhat be a work in progress, or maybe a work in evolution.