The Italian guitarist Angelo Marchese introduced the music of the Serbian-US composer Dušan Bogdanović to the Brilliant Classics catalogue in 2015 with an album of sonatas, bagatelles, studies and dances (95194). His second recording dedicated to Bogdanović concentrates on a single collection, the 48 Seasonal Preludes which gradually took shape over several years as a fusion of classical, jazz, and ethnic styles.

Born in Belgrade in 1955, long resident in the US, the guitarist-composer Dušan Bogdanović studied with Ginastera, among others, and has been commissioned by leading guitarists and major performing arts groups across the US. He has held teaching positions at conservatoires in Belgrade, San Francisco and presently Geneva, performed with both classical and jazz ensembles and made many albums both of his own music and that of his contemporaries.

Structured in four sets of twelve, one set for each season, the 48 Seasonal Preludes explore a middle ground between improvisation and composition. The preludes influenced by blues include the Autumn Prelude no.4, written in memory of the guitarist Roland Dyens, and Winter Prelude no.9, after Charlie Mingus’s Goodbye Pork Pie Hat. Autumn Preludes no.3 and no.9 are in a fusion style reminiscent of Weather Report.

The folk music of Bogdanović’s Balkan homelands surfaces in other preludes, but so does Japanese modal harmony, and the language of Satie, Debussy, Rodrigo and Scriabin, whether in direct quotation or in homage to their musical worlds. Spring Prelude no.8 is a fugue based on the theme of the Art of Fugue by J.S. Bach. There’s even a reference to Monty Norman’s James Bond theme buried within the collection.

According to Guitar magazine, Angelo Marchese is ‘a profound performer of supreme technical mastery.’ He has immersed himself in Bogdanović’s musical world in order to add this compelling volume to the ever-expanding Brilliant Classics library of guitar music.