Das Berlin Guitar Ensemble (BGE) ist eine Gruppe von Gitarristen aus aller Welt, die von Hernan Nunez geleitet wird. Seine Besetzung bewegt sich zwischen 7 und 24 Spielern um ein festes Kernteam. Das Repertoire der Gruppe ist sehr breit aufgestellt und beinhaltet Arrangements von Klassikern aus Filmsoundtracks, außergewöhnliche Eigenkompositionen, anspruchsvolle Rock- und Pop-Standards sowie zeitgenössische klassische Arrangements.
Alle Spieler nutzen das „Guitar Craft Tuning“, welches ein deutlich weiteres Klangspektrum als die Standard-Gitarrenstimmung hat und einen innovativen Gitarrensound ermöglicht. Das Repertoire wird ständig weiterentwickelt und ist für alle musikalischen Stilrichtungen offen. Die Musik bleibt dabei stets einem gemeinsamen konzeptuellen Ansatz treu.
Ein charakteristischer, bedeutender Teil des Repertoires sind teils improvisierte, teils geschriebene Gruppenkompositionen, bei denen eine Note oder ein Akkord von einem Spieler zum anderen weitergegeben wird. Dieser einzigartige Ansatz wird als „Circulation“ bezeichnet.
The Berlin Guitar Ensemble (BGE) is a group of guitarists from all over the world directed by Hernán Nuñez. Its line up is constantly developing around a core team, moving from 7 to 24 players. Its repertoire is very wide, including arrangements of film soundtrack classics, own compositions, and contemporary classic arrangements. All players use the ‘Guitar Craft Tuning’ which has a much wider sonic spectrum than the standard tuning, bringing an innovative sound to the guitar.
The repertoire is constantly evolving and is open to all styles. The music remains true to a common conceptual approach.
A characteristic and outstanding part of the repertoire are improvised and/or written group compositions where one note (or chord) is passed from one player to the other… this unique approach is known as ‘Circulations’.
The group began performing in 1992 in Berlin and toured Germany until 1996 as part of the Guitar Circle Seminars that took place during that period. ‘The Grossderschau Recordings’, an album including several BGE performances between 1992-1996 was released in August 2000.
A series of BGE Projects began taking place in the Villa Ruhe (Alfeld, Germany) in 1998 and the team toured Germany until 2001, and then Spain and Italy releasing the ‘Berlin Guitar Ensemble’ Album in 2002, featuring studio and live recordings made during this period.
The group is currently collaborating in a series of performance projects with avant-garde electronic artist 1605munro (aka Andrés Jankowski) with whom they have been performing and recording since 2011 in Germany, Holland and Spain, releasing three albums together: The BGE vs 1605munro Vol I in 2011, Vol II in 2013, and Vol III in 2017. A collaboration with Berlin based duo a-un (1605munro & percussionist Kiyoshi Fujikawa) began in 2018, leading to performances in Berlin in 2019.
‘The BGE Vol II’ album (featuring live and studio performances from 2011 to present) is planned for release in 2023.
