“A fine example of a guitarist’s devotion to the full exploration of his instrument’s capabilities.”

    The above statement is a quote from a 1980 Guitar Player Magazine review of Paul Chasman’s second album, Modern Art.  Now, more than twenty years later, this description reads like a prediction of Chasman’s career, and can easily be used to summarize his statement of purpose.

    Paul Chasman’s professional musical development can be traced through his album releases, each one being a culmination of a major period of growth.  In 1979, Paul made his recording debut with Solo Guitar, a collection of interpretations of songs from a variety of sources: blues, bluegrass, jazz, and ragtime.  The album, dedicated to his boyhood hero, Doc Watson, was praised by Guitar Player Magazine who called his music, “refreshing,” and said, “...he evinces warmth and sincerity....”  Frets Magazine declared, “He demonstrates his mastery...” and called his playing, “...one of the finest examples of fingerpicking you’ll ever hear.”

    Buoyed by his initial success, Paul Chasman released Modern Art in 1980, an ambitious collection of original guitar compositions, attempting to fuse his modern classical influence with jazz and folk styles. Frets Magazine stated, “Avant-gard may be too strong a word for Paul Chasman, but just barely.  Challenging music.”  Apparently too challenging for many listeners.  Paul often tells the story of the number of people who told him, “I really like your albums.  Especially the first one.”

    This experience caused Chasman to struggle with the problem of how to channel the adventurous compositional energy he was experiencing into a more accessible format.  In 1984, he teamed with percussionist, Roger Hadley, to record So Be It.  With Hadley’s infectious rhythmic style and a strong melodic sense, he began to address the problem.

    About this time, Paul Chasman began experimenting with harmonics.  Having heard the bell-like cascades of Ted Green, Chet Atkins, and Lenny Breau, Paul wanted to explore the possibilities of the technique.  Over the years, he developed a system of scales and exercises, which enabled him to take harmonics beyond the level of flourishes and tricks, and to use them to play entire pieces.  He wrote extensively about this technique, most notably in Guitar Player and Frets Magazines.  During this period, Chasman released two cassettes which reflected his new maturity as a composer along with his ground breaking harmonics.  The first was Just To Dance, in which he utilized percussion, bass, cello, flute, violin, and voice in a variety of configurations.  The second was Solo Man, which took Paul back to his solo guitar roots, and solidified his reputation as, “A master guitarist.  A major composer.”  (The Oregonian)

    Fourteen years after Paul Chasman released his first collection of guitar interpretations, he came full circle to record Real Songs, a fully realized statement of where he had been.  Guitar Player Magazine said, “His harmonics technique is simply astounding, as is his ability to execute two or three parts simultaneously.  An essential solo acoustic disk.”

    After Real Songs, Paul came to a crossroads.  He was haunted by a piece he grew up hearing his mother play on the piano,  Sergei Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 7.  This piece, breathtaking in its scope, daunting in its physical challenges, and ferocious in its intensity, loomed like a mountain which Chasman felt compelled to climb.  He spent an entire year transcribing it for guitar, and another year learning to play it.  When he finally released the cd in 1996, he had broken through a new level of guitar playing.

    Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 7 opened up a new world for Paul.  It led him to the classical guitar.  Switching from steel string to classical, Paul Chasman discovered a whole new world of tonal colors, dynamic range, contrapuntal complexity, and compositional freedom.  After a year of exploring, Chasman wrote Guitar Sonatas No. 1 and 2.  They were released in 1998 and are featured on this website.

     The year 2000 was a busy one for Paul.  He released a CD of his new compositions, Songs from the Bay;  a collection of guitar Conversations with Doug Smith, and his Suite for Cello and Guitar, played with cellist Hamilton Cheifetz.  The Oregonion described this work as “gorgeous, (with) bittersweet power...haunting...entertaining.”  In the fall of the same year, Chasman and his partners in The Acoustic Guitar Summit released their second CD, Summit Meeting, a guitar smorgasbord of music ranging from Django Rheinhardt to Louis Armstrong to Tchaikowsky.  While the Oregonion praised the Summit's “crystalline passion and verve,” the Dalles Chronicle may have described the Summit best with this:  “World-class music without world-class egos.”  Since then, he has composed a program of trio music for  two guitars and cello, which he will record with Doug Smith and Hamilton Cheifetz this summer and release in the fall of 2001.