Nigel Gavin: Visitation (Thrum/Rhythmethod)

Guitarist Gavin is probably well known to more people than they realise: he has played with the Nairobi Trio, the Jews Brothers, created the guitar orchestra Gitbox Rebellion, and has been on albums by Wayne Gillespie, Ross Mullins and Whirimako Black. But it has always been his own albums -- limited edition and so under the radar for most people -- which have seen him at his most exploratory and interesting.

In mid '06 I was invited to write the liner notes for this album. I often receive such offers but rarely take them up, they have to be pretty special for me to want to lend my name to them. This one was a given though. I loved it.

Gavin plays seven and eleven string guitars and pulls from them an astonishingly diverse array of melodies from what sound like Elizabethan lute music to world music influences and delicate miniatures.

I was happy to lend my name to it then -- and now.