Is physical media dead? Or is it having a comeback? If the latter is the case, let’s have more unusual physical forms, like the guitar-shaped USB drive on which you can find the Suen-Kam Guitar Duo’s debut album, “Between Strings.”
Guitarists Shiuen-Huang Suen and Kenneth Kam met through the Eastman School of Music as graduate students and also connected through the community of the Rochester Chinese Christian Church. They’ve been playing together in concerts over the past six years (including on a Live from Hochstein program that I hosted in 2022), and they have just now just committed some of their artistry to a recorded album.
Dreamy. Meditative. Lovely. These are some of the words that immediately come to mind when listening to most of this music, whether in Enrique Granados’s “Oriental” from the “Danzas españolas” [Spanish Dances], a beloved Franz Schubert Serenade (arranged by fellow Eastman guitar alum Shih-yu Liu), the “Cavatina” by Stanley Myers from the score to the movie “The Deer Hunter.”
Those are some of the album’s biggest familiar hits, but there are also discoveries, like the music of Cuban composer Eduardo Martín, “Mirándote” [Looking at You], played as an engaging solo by Kam.
You can also find a little more snap, rhythm and brightness in a set of five pieces by French baroque composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. Originally miniature pieces for the harpsichord, they make the transition from keyboard to guitars perfectly in the arrangements by Oscar Casares, as played by Kam and Suen.
The performances are impeccable, and the collaboration on-point throughout, so it makes wonderful, full-attention listening. But if I may dare suggest it — you can also sneak these tracks onto holiday-gathering playlists, and they would impart a sense of joy, peace and togetherness.
