ISERLOHN 2026 – Personal impressions from a regular participant
Rolf Straver
One of the joys of summer—and an excellent way to spend a holiday—is attending a music festival, where you enjoy not only the program but also the company of fellow participants. There is a vast array of music festivals to choose from across various countries, particularly during July and August. I have been a regular visitor to the Iserlohn Guitar Symposium since 2007; although the intervals between my visits have varied, I have likely attended at least ten times by now. Yet, I always return with fresh insights into guitar playing, new friends within the guitar community, and wonderful memories—including reunions with instructors and other regulars. For those who might think a southern country is a better choice for summer: during all my visits, the weather in Iserlohn was "Mediterranean" too; we had lunch outdoors and gathered socially on the terraces in the town center after the evening concerts.
It is not easy to describe the overall experience of the Iserlohn Guitar Symposium; it is one of the largest and most diverse international guitar festivals, serving as a meeting place not only for ambitious guitarists but also for innovative luthiers and publishers of guitar music. For some participants, it is a serious competition; for others, an enlightening masterclass that leads to a breakthrough to a higher level; and others still go home with a firm resolve to save up for a guitar by a specific maker... For me, as a composer, it is always a fantastic opportunity to stay connected with the guitar world and find inspiration for new compositions. My visit to Iserlohn took place right after the Baltic Guitar Festival in Lithuania (which, incidentally, is highly recommended) and before the more general Stavelot Chamber Music Festival in Belgium. These two other festivals also served as a great source of inspiration for a composer of chamber music for guitar. Yet Iserlohn was in no way inferior: I was pleased to see, once again, the significant attention the symposium has long devoted to music in the "guitar +" category.
Fifty percent of the recitals at the Oberste Stadtkirche featured two or more performers, expanding the composer's textural and timbral possibilities. This year’s lineup included guitar duos (Duo Cizmek-Stojakovic, Montenegrin Guitar Duo, Duo KM) and the legendary Baltic Guitar Quartet, as well as combinations such as lute and baroque flute (Dorothee Oberlinger & Edin Karamazov) and guitar with bandoneon (Duo Bandini-Chiacchiaretta). Naturally, there was also the annual contribution by Gerald Garcia for the participants' guitar orchestra. This time, the incomparable eminence grise of the guitar conducted his concerto “Winter Bloom” written for guitar and guitar orchestra, featuring world-class Chinese soloist Manni Wu. Maestro Gerald always gives his introduction in flawless "Germglish," somewhat reminiscent of the Easter blessing the Pope delivers to the world in various languages... As for the solo recitals: don't get me wrong, they were every bit as impressive. Just look at who performed—I hardly need say more: Ponce specialist maestro Hans-Werner Huppertz, and the three French "Rois de la guitare": Thibaut Garcia, Judicael Perroy, and Raphael Feuillâtre.
And then there is someone who stands in a class of his own: Jorge Caballero. He has become the world champion at performing guitar transcriptions of large-scale orchestral and piano works—pieces many would think impossible to play on the guitar, until he proved otherwise. Naturally, full credit goes to the late Kazuhito Yamashita, who initiated this ambitious expansion of the guitar repertoire. Yet, I must say that the way Jorge Caballero plays these massive arrangements appeals to me far more. He created a truly convincing transcription of Liszt’s monumental Sonata in B minor, a significant addition to the guitar repertoire of top performers. This work poses an immense challenge even for the best pianists, let alone when playing a version that is even more densely packed, compressed into the range of a classical guitar. I therefore fully understood the skepticism of a professional pianist in the audience with whom I had spoken before the recital. After all, Liszt is considered the composer whose works often require a pianist with three hands... How, then, can someone play that music with two fingers fewer than a pianist? And with the added constraint that two fingers are always required to produce just a single note? Yet I must say I did not miss a single note from the original version; I even appreciated, especially in the beautiful, quieter passages, how the guitar could provide different tonal colors, something a piano cannot do. Of course, one should avoid comparing it directly to the original; the guitar cannot achieve the massive dynamic build-up a piano can, but - much like the guitar version of Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony and similar large-scale arrangements - view them as ambitious sonatas for the guitar. And the performance of the Liszt work at the Oberste Stadtkirche was, once again, world-class.
A brief aside, but a compliment that simply must be included: everyone is always full of praise for the festival's flawless organization, and I would also like to highlight Thomas Kirchhoff’s marketing skills; time and again, the church was packed with an audience comprising not only festival participants but also local people. Years ago, I organized guitar recitals myself in the chamber music hall in Nijmegen, a Dutch city much larger than Iserlohn, and it was always a struggle to draw an audience of 200 people for recitals featuring the same big names and competition winners seen in Iserlohn!
Speaking competition: including a set piece in the program (Prelude 1 by Dale Kavanagh) was an excellent idea. It allowed for a more precise comparison of the candidates' musicality, measuring them against the same yardstick, so to speak. After all, interpretations of the very same piece always vary widely. Tempo, dynamics, agogic accents, and tone color: countless factors contribute to a successful performance. The prelude was a masterful, idiomatic guitar composition; Dale knows how to write for the instrument. Yet, some candidates managed to make the piece sparkle even more. Dale, who was also on the general jury, had the privilege of selecting the best performer of her work; this time, the decision was a shared prize for Gwyneth Aggeler and Zhuo Ran—two names to remember, given that they were also the top performers in the final. However, the first prize went to Gwyneth. I may be mistaken, but as a listener, I got the impression that an outstanding command of tone color, both technically and artistically, was a guiding principle for the jury's decisions throughout the competition. I fully agree with that approach. In the recapitulation of Bach’s Fugue BWV 997, Gwyneth surprised everyone with a beautiful shift in tone color; it was reminiscent of an organist pulling out the flute stops. It was a truly magical moment; many in the audience looked at each other in astonishment. This may well have tipped the scales in favor of the first place. I heard several people say they struggled to make a definitive choice and also regarded Zhuo Ran, from China, as a favorite; His brilliant rendition of Rodrigo’s Toccata, a piece long considered unplayable, was phenomenal. It serves as yet another reminder of just how strong a claim all the finalists had to the first prize. I was glad the responsibility of choosing didn't fall to me... It was a sheer delight to listen to them all: two and a half hours of solo guitar playing that kept the audience captivated right to the very last moment. The highly expert jury didn't take long to reach a verdict, allowing us to quickly move on to 'Fuchs und Hase', the place to be for the evening hours, to catch up with everyone over a variety of German beers.
This makes for a fitting final chord to a very personal, and perhaps, as a result, unbalanced, look back at this festival. Admittedly, plenty of wonderful activities and fantastic people have gone unmentioned. But I see in the bottom-left corner of my screen that I am approaching 1,400 words... So, to the reader who has made it to the end of my text, I would say: don’t hesitate to travel to Iserlohn in 2027 and have your personal experience there! And let’s meet!