I must confess to not playing nearly as much classical music as I should, while I have very few classical guitar albums in my collection, and given just how much I have enjoyed this I can see I need to rethink this as what we have here is a delight from beginning to end. What Kingsland has done here is to take pieces from some of his favourite composers, Francisco Tarrega, Agustín Barrios Mangoré, Antonio Lauro, Andrés Segovia, Heitor Villa-Lobos, and Isaac Albéniz, and has produced an album which is literally him and classical guitar. Each composer is credited against the song title so it is easy for people like me with no knowledge to easily search them out if one wishes. Just a little reverb, a musician and an acoustic guitar, does it get any better than this?
This is true beauty from a master of his craft and one can only hope that we hear more from Kingsland in this vein in the near future. Mind you, that might be a little difficult given that he is currently in three metal bands and has been a member of the mighty Nile since 2017, shredding alongside Karl Sanders. Anyone who enjoys technical metal knows what it takes to produce music in that genre, and here Kingsland demonstrates his chops in a very different direction indeed, and I must confess that even though I love Nile I am sure there are times when I will turn to this album instead. This is classical guitar music being performed by someone who truly loves the genre, and is taking on classic pieces and making them his own. For fans of the guitar, whether it is being played delicately and emotionally as it is here, or being driven along at great pace. This is sublime.
Rating. 9/10