In 2015 when Kai Narezo, flamenco guitarist and video producer, was auditioning new recording gear for his gig with guitarsalon.com, he reached out to Radial to talk 500 series.
Narezo’s challenge was to source gear that would faithfully represent not just the nuance of every performance, but the truest representation of the sound coming each of the instruments played. After all, as the ‘premier online community, showroom and shop for classical guitars, flamenco guitars and guitar accessories’, the videos would showcase not only some very rare instruments, but also provide sales support for gear on the market.
Narezo tested out a Radial Workhorse Cube 500 chassis with two Radial PowerPre 500 modules and never looked back. He explains: “I heard a much bigger difference than I thought I would for this product demo stuff, so I’m super happy and definitely keeping the PowerPres.” He continues: “I’ve been lucky to have the opportunity to record so many great guitars and players through Guitar Salon International and like to think I’ve figured out how to capture the best a player and their guitar have to give. I’ve probably recorded more different guitars than anyone in the world, including some insanely rare guitars built by Torres, Hauser, Rodriguez, Santos Hernandez, Esteso, you name it.”
Narezo recently used the PowerPres to record the latest CD of George Sakellariou, a project in honor of the 200th birthday of luthier Antonio de Torres Jurado, more commonly known as Torres. Narezo describes Torres as the Stradivarius of the guitar world. Sakellariou plays two very special Torres guitars on the CD – an 1862 First-epoch and an 1888 Second-epoch. “We consider it our mission to share the sound of these historic guitars with the world, so we were thrilled when we were able to borrow back two of the best sounding Torres guitars we had ever sold to record a full-length CD with George, one of the most sensitive and accomplished players to have recorded videos with us. I used the PowerPres with Neumann KM84s to give the recording some lovely air.”
