Brisbane guitarist Van Larkins is a man who lets his fingers do the talking.
A prodigious, self-taught talent specialising in the fingerstyle technique, Van has built a reputation as one of Australia’s best acoustic guitarists.
This December he teams with Italian guitarist Andrea Valeri for his ‘Fingerstyle Guitar Concert Series’, the first of what Van hopes is the start of an international venture. “I’m excited about this tour, but I’m also excited for the future because this is an international tour,” he says.
L-R: Andrea Valeri and Van Larkins“Even though I’m a domestic act, I’m going to be bringing someone over from a different country each year. So this year it's Italy with Andrea Valeri and next year I might look at getting someone from Canada.
“That's my way of living in Australia, because I love it here, but I can also create networks internationally. I’m excited about bringing it here and it's a challenge but something I’m really passionate about.
“I really want to unite the fingerstyle community. I’m not really into the whole ‘tall poppy syndrome’; it can be a bit odd. The better you do the more people want to knock you down; it's a weird phenomenon here.”
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Van released his first solo album ‘Wandering Hands’ in 2012, having previously released an album called ‘Myriad’ with Ross Hunter, as the duo Hunter Van Larkins. Van is currently working on his second solo release, ‘Cinder Moon’, which he says will be out early next year. “It's sounding really good,” he says.
“I’ve got the masters back from Canada; the guy mastering over there is Antoine Dufour, he's one of the powerhouse players on CandyRat Records and this will be the second album he's mastered for me.
“In addition to being an exceptional guitarist, he's also a real perfectionist when it comes to mastering so the songs are sounding amazing. I’m really happy with the result.”
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The release of ‘Cinder Moon’ will be in conjunction with that of the world’s first documentary film dedicated to the fingerstyle technique. “It should come out in February 2017 and I’m going to be releasing my album at that time as well,” he says.
“There's a guy in Melbourne called Drew Roller and he was successful in launching a crowdfunding campaign to make the world's first fingerstyle movie/ documentary. That’s taken him around the world interviewing all the big names in fingerstyle guitar and he's finally got Tommy Emmanuel on there as well, that was the icing on the cake.
“I’m featured on there and all the CandyRat guys like Andy McKee and Antoine Dufour.”
Van is also a guitar teacher and over the past 12 months has been developing a ground-breaking new way of teaching guitar to the visually impaired. “I’ve been creating this way of teaching the visually impaired where I have lines on the back of the guitar neck, kind of like braille so you can feel which fret you're on, and I’ve also altered the tuning to open D-minor which makes it the easiest to learn the guitar but you can expand on it later on.
“It's working around the concept of if you are without a particular sense then the other senses are heightened. That's where I think the visually impaired will become the best teachers for this style and it might actually open up some amazing doors to technique as well as melody, songwriting and performance; I think it could be a really cool thing.”
Van Larkins Shows
Sat 3 Dec - Shadowfax Winery (Werribee, 1pm)Sat 3 Dec - Paris Cat (Melbourne)
Sun 4 Dec - Shadowfax Winery (Werribee)
Mon 5 Dec - Smiths Alternative (Canberra)
Wed 7 Dec - Stag & Hunter (Newcastle)
Thu 8 Dec - The Brass Monkey (Cronulla)
Sun 11 Dec - Hotel Blue (Blue Mountains)
Thu 15 Dec - Dust Temple (Gold Coast)
Fri 16 Dec - Studio 188 (Ipswich)
Sat 17 Dec - Bison Bar (Sunshine Coast)
Sun 18 Dec - The Milk factory (Brisbane)
