Guitar Magazine, March '96 article:
by Pete Prown

Acoustic guitar ensembles are nothing new: Whether it's the classical strains of the Romeros or the fusion flash of Di Meola, McLaughlin & de Lucia, the multi-acoustic concept has been around for years. But the California Guitar Trio has added their own wrinkle to the formula. Following several years of study and performance with Robert Fripp, the three guitarists Bert Lams, Hideyo Moriya, and Paul Richards have just released their second album, Invitation, and it is clearly signaling a change in acoustic music. Whereas once you had fingerstyle classical guitarists and plectrum-style rock, jazz, and bluegrass players, the Trio mixes it all up, approaching any and every genre with a scintillating plectrum-based attack. Be it Vivaldi or The Ventures, CGT is paving the way for acoustic guitar in the 21st century.

If you've ever wondered what Beethoven's Fifth Symphony or Bach's Toccata And Fugue would sound like on three steel-string guitars, wonder no more. On their recent tour opening for King Crimson, the California Guitar Trio earned nightly standing ovations for these pieces, which they blended with rock and bluegrass standards, as well as their eye-widening originals.

Much of the band's classical emphasis comes from Belgium-born Bert Lams, who studied nylon-string for years before bursting forth into the CGT's wild, blue yonder. "I was classically trained, yet I always loved electric guitar," says Lams. "Unfortunately, it was hard to find an electric teacher in Belgium, so I studied classical for about six years, and taught some, too. I guess we do a lot of classical material because that's my background, which, aside from the Bach and Beethoven, includes a version of the popular 'Fratres' by Arvo Part. As far as the arranging of the classical material, it is pretty straightforward. Our transcriber [classical composer Stan Funicelli] just puts out the three main themes from each of the pieces and arranges them for three guitars. But when we write something ourselves, we usually do it together, as a group. On 'Yamanashi Blues,' for example, I came up with the main funky riff and then we all sat around and jammed on it until we found the things that sounded right to us. Our pieces begin evolving from there. Playing live also helps us in that regard, since we can hear what works and what doesn't in front of an audience."

Japan-born Hideyo Moriya, meanwhile, is the Trio's resident surf-rock expert, reflecting his country's passion for the early rock sounds of The Ventures, The Surfaris, and all things in Lake Placid Blue. "I went to Berklee in 1982-83, but I'm not a jazz player," says Moriya. "I started playing guitar when I was 12 years old, mostly from listening to The Ventures, but I also like The Beatles and most of the English bands like Yes, Roxy Music, and King Crimson. Some of our stuff may sound a little like Crimson, but that's more from Robert Fripp's Guitar Craft seminars, which is where we all met. Robert had us playing all these eighth-note sections and lots of unusual rhythmic grooves. That affected us quite a bit. Later on, we played in his League Of Crafty Guitarists and then in the Robert Fripp String Quintet with touch-guitarist Trey Gunn, who's now with Crimson. We're all part of one big family, really."

According to Paul Richards, however, the three want to go beyond Fripp and tackle anything that strikes their musical fancy, no matter how eclectic or far out. "Our albums are like an adventure where we get to travel through different song styles and experiment with different textures," remarks the Utah-born guitarist. "One song will have a Southwestern theme and then we'll go to Germany and do some Bach. The Mideast, Russia, America we'll go anywhere with our music. We don't worry about categories or trying to fit in. We just play what we like and we don't belong to any specific tradition like classical or jazz. For example, we do originals like 'Yamanashi Blues,' as well as covers like an arrangement of Ennio Morricone's 'The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly,' or 'Walk, Don't Run' by The Ventures."

What is it like to play in a three-guitar band that's about as far away from the Lynyrd Skynyrd model as possible? According to Lams, it's quite a different six-string experience. "Well, the good and bad thing about playing with three guitars is that you can't hide. So the audience can hear everything, but you have to be on the ball all the time as a player. When we were playing with the League Of Crafty Guitarists, there were at times 20 players on stage, so you could hide more, but then again, your individual voice didn't come out as much. Another thing we try to do is interact on stage so it isn't just three boring guys sitting there. We try to maintain contact to keep the energy up. And unlike other 'acoustic' bands, we play loud, as the audiences on the Crimson tour have found out. We've been received well everywhere. We even got a few standing ovations in Texas. That's a real guitar state."

Another aspect of the California Guitar Trio's setup which may surprise listeners is that they're not all amazing sight-readers. Instead they arrange their material the old-fashioned way: by plain hard work. "We all read a little, though Bert is by far the most advanced, via his classical studies," says Richards. "We actually just work through each piece bar by bar, especially the Beethoven. Actually, that one came together pretty fast, a lot of which has to do with our new tuning. It's C G D A E G, low to high--it's sort of a C pentatonic scale."

Gear is an important part of the Trio's sound, too, as reflected in the harpsichord-like tones they occasionally conjure up. Interestingly, they fully reflect Fripp's famous notion of a "small, mobile, intelligent unit" in their stage gear. Instead of individually miking up each guitar, all three players are plugged into one rack unit, which contains a mixer and an array of signal processing gear. From there, a stereo feed goes to the PA system, allowing the band to control all aspects of their sound and effects. Not surprisingly, the California Guitar Trio's live sound is superlative, just as it is on their records.

"Sonically it may surprise some, but everything on the record was created by just the three acoustic guitars, though we do use electronic effects to create different sounds," states Richards. "There's a song called 'Punta Patri' where I'm using an E-Bow through a fuzzbox to create a distorted, looping sound. I play a little slide on there, too, but it's all done on acoustic guitars. Originally, we all played Ovations, but now Hideyo is using an Ovation Elite with a hex pickup for his Roland V-Guitar and synth, while Bert and I are experimenting with Taylors. We both use the new 812 models, though Bert's is a thinline that will be marketed as the 812 Custom, I believe. So far, we're extremely impressed, though we plan to keep experimenting with various acoustics.

"Then again, just having three acoustics all the time can be wearing, so we're looking into ways to get new tones and sounds into our repertoire. We can go more electronically like Hideyo is doing, or more into pure acoustics. Right now, we essentially straddle the 'acoustic/electric' sound and it works well for us, but in the future, anything's game.