TEMUR KVITELASHVILI

I have been listening to Temur tonight, courtesy of YouTube. Anyone that Allan Holdsworth says is amazing is worthy of note, believe me.

[Embedded video from YouTube: Temur Kvitelashvili – 21 Guitars]

He’s about my age, and he is clearly influenced by Allan Holdsworth, John McLaughlin, George Benson, and possibly Al di Meola (as well as a few other maybes — who knows, say  Larry Carlton, or Lee Ritenour — anyway, you get the picture; that’s the genre).

Temur Kvitelashvili is an excellent Jazz Fusion guitarist — but we have loads of them already. He’s not big on effects or trickery, and I have not seen him tap like Malmsteen or Van Halen, but he’s not entirely old school. He can shred a bit — but these days who doesn’t do that?

What makes him different? well, he does a bit of singing  — that’s pretty unusual (although he’s no George Benson), but I think the main thing he does that is defining is traditional Georgian folk music for the electric guitar — now that’s different, isn’t it?

The technique is fast — gypsy-like, Django evoked, it can remind you, at times, of di Meola or McLaughlin, but it is not Indian or Mexican/ Spanish/ Moorish; it is more Russian, and possibly more (if I can say this), “Jewish”.

“Tbiliso” is a song about the city, and it is superb as an example of Temur’s work. I like his Hava Nagila…

[Embedded video from YouTube.com]

If you want more, search YouTube or check out his website here: www.temurkvitelashvili.com

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Tbiliso