Steffen Basho-Junghans

by Charlie WilmothExperimental musician and visual artist Steffen Basho-Junghans is best known -- at least as far as music is concerned -- for his unusual guitar technique. His playing, which incorporates a wide variety of extended techniques and nods to North Indian raga and American folk music, is close in spirit to fellow guitarist John Fahey. Basho-Junghans was born in Saxony, Germany, in 1953. In 1978, he co-founded the German folk group Wacholder. Soon after, he began presenting concerts of solo steel-string guitar. He was prominent in Germany throughout the 1980s as an organizer: In 1981, he set up a guitar festival in Berlin, and in 1986 he began directing the Berlin Guitar Center. He released a number of recordings in Germany on his own Blue Moment Arts label, beginning with 12 String Solo in 1989, but his albums were not widely available stateside until Song of the Earth was released in 2000. Inside and Waters in Azure, both for solo guitar, followed in 2001 and 2002, respectively. Landscapes in Exile was also released in 2002, on Blue Moment Arts.