Romance del Ruiseñor by Maurice Sherbanée

Performed by guitarist Mark Achuff. The composer of this piece is my departed friend Maurice Sherbanée. Many Los Angeles based classical guitarists came to know Maurice via his attendance at the the American Guitar Society, and through his association with Howard Heitmeyer - his dear friend and his guitar tutor for over 30 years. Maurice was an extraordinary man with a fascinating life. His talents, abilities and interest were so wide and varied that all who knew him readily agreed that he was a true Renaissance man. He was an artist who had much success in his efforts with comedy, singing, dancing, stage theatre and motion picture acting. But wait there's more - he loved playing the classical guitar and he played competently well, although not at a concert artist's level. And best of all from my view point - he composed many beautiful melodies for the guitar such as this piece - Romance del Ruiseñor.

Maurice Sherbanée Maurice studied guitar with Howard Heitmeyer for well over 30 years. He loved to compose beautiful melodies that he sang and then had Howard help him transcribe and arrange his composition into beautiful guitar solos with amazing harmonizations and inventive musicality. I was very lucky in that I was one of the first guitarists to work with Maurice and his compositions thanks to HH endorsing me. It was an honor and a pleasure to have Maurice coach me on how he wanted his pieces to be interpreted. I would then perform his composition as arranged by HH, at monthly AGS meetings. After performing 5 or 6 of his compositions, we decided the next phase should be to make a CD of Maurice's compositions so he would have something to bring to the public arena. This was before the days of ubiquitous Youtube and CDs were in their heyday. The CD was named "Maurice's Pieces"
10 Compositions For Solo Classical Guitar. Romance del Ruiseñor is the first piece on the CD. One by one, I will put all 10 of Maurice's Pieces on Youtube for your enjoyment and interest.

Maurice told me that he came up with his Romance del Ruiseñor melody and the various flavors of the moods it contains, as he was reflecting on a childhood memory he had of living in Iraq. His family had large orchards of trees bearing fruit and nuts. He noted that the there were wonderful birds of color and delightful song that would grace the orchards and bring happiness and delight as he strolled. Ruiseñor means the Nightingale bird. And as literature and poetry tell us, the most beautiful song of all is from the Nightingale. Maurice captured the song of the Nightingale very nicely in his composition.

Some of what made Maurice an extraordinary man with a such fascinating life, was the fact that he was a Mizrahi Jew from Iraq, born in Baghdad of an Iraqi father and a mother from Singapore. He said he spent a happy childhood in a well to do Baghdad community but that ended suddenly and tragically when he was not quite eleven. World War II spread to Iraq and suddenly targeted his Jewish community with deadly violence. His family immediately fled to safety in India where he spent his adolescence. Then when civil war broke out in India, his family, unable to gain admission to the United States, fled once more -- this time living stateless in post-war Japan for 20 years until they were finally able to emigrate to California. His career in entertainment (comedy, singing, dancing, composer of songs/guitar music, stage theatre and motion picture acting,) began as a nightclub singer in Japan, but truly flourished when he arrived in the U.S. His background, strikes me as a bit similar to that of Irving Berlin. It is powerful and remarkable that truly creative artists often have backgrounds and impetus rooted in the experience of facing terror and injustice.

Maurice passed away in December 2023. He was a gifted musician and composer, specializing in musical pieces for classical guitar. With the help of his dear friend and guitar tutor Howard Heitmeyer, he wrote nearly 100 beautiful songs and melodies which were then scored for the solo classical guitar. I will be releasing more of Maurices pieces to my Youtube channel over the next few weeks and months.