Chapman University School of Music professor and Orange County Guitar Circle president Jeff Cogan has great nails.
What is the Orange County Guitar Circle?
The Orange County Guitar Circle is a non-profit organization that supports the classical guitar. It is open to community members and anyone who's interested. The Guitar Circle has been in operation since the late '60s. We have concerts monthly. Alternating months we have professional concert artists perform for us. On the month we don't have pros, we have amateur guitarists from around Orange County, including students and young people, old people, and anyone interested in the classical guitar.
For someone not familiar with the distinction—like me—what is classical guitar?
There are two important ways of describing what the classical guitar is. One is the instrument itself. A classical guitar is a nylon-string guitar. It's nylon strings, but when it was being developed it was gut strings. That goes back a long way. Nobody really uses gut anymore. It's an instrument that has evolved from the early Baroque period up through the end of the Romantic period, when it really took its modern shape. The modern classical guitar is completely acoustic. Many people, when you say acoustic guitar, think of a folk guitar or steel-stringed guitar, also known as a dreadnaught. But that's not what we're talking about. And we play classical music on a nylon-stringed instrument. The classical music part is kind of important because most of the repertoire that you hear at Orange County Guitar Circle performances is classical-music literature and not the popular-music literature or things you typically hear on the radio on pop stations. It's basically art music performed on the guitar.
You mentioned gut strings. Is that what people mean when they say "cat gut?"
Yeah, but it does not actually come from a cat. It comes from cow intestine, but it's called cat gut. That was the original material used for guitar strings. All modern strings are made of nylon or composite materials similar to nylon.
Are classical guitars finger picked?
Yes. Classical guitarists do not use guitar picks. They use fingernails. Most electric and acoustic players—country, jazz—use a flat pick. Some musicians also use finger picks, picks that fit on the ends of their fingers. But classical guitarists use their natural fingernails cut and shaped to a very specific size and smoothness to make a beautiful tone on the instrument.
Do people get that done professionally?
Well, usually classical guitarists will take care of their own fingernails. Occasionally when we break a nail, we'll have it repaired by a professional. And we really go to these extreme lengths to make our fingernails perfect. We file them. We shape them. We polish them, and smooth them—we want to make sure the edge is as smooth as it can possibly be so as not to create any friction in the tone and any bad sound. The scraping that can result when your nail is rough is very pronounced. So we try our best to eliminate that.
People might not realize that Orange County has much of a classical-guitar scene.
We have as much to offer as LA does in terms of classical guitar. And Chapman is probably the best place in the area because we have the Orange County Guitar Circle, and we have featured artists coming in to give master classes and concerts. So, they don't have to go to LA. There's lots happening here.
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT OCGC.ORG AND CHAPMAN.EDU/MUSIC OR CALL JEFF AT (714) 997-6591.
