Why Do They All Hate Yepes? — PART IV: “The Living Witness” — Infinite Progress in Practice

In South Africa, Fritz Buss embodied Yepes’s pedagogical philosophy: infinite progress, individual development, and artistic autonomy over conformity.

This is Part IV of a four-part series examining classical guitar’s Modernist origins and the institutional suppression of Narciso Yepes.
— Part I: The Lie
— Part II: The Machinery
— Part III: The Cover-Up
— Part IV: The Living Witness (and reference list)
Read the complete essay here.

The pedagogical divide documented in this series wasn’t merely theoretical. While Segovian orthodoxy enforced conformity through “stable truths” students could apply “for the rest of their lives,” an alternative lineage quietly demonstrated that infinite progress — pedagogical openness, individual development, inexhaustible discovery — actually worked. Fritz Buss (*1930), who studied with Narciso Yepes from 1961 onwards and founded South Africa’s most significant classical guitar programme, embodied these anti-Modernist principles in his own teaching.

Coda: A Living Witness

In a 1987 radio interview, Buss articulated the philosophical chasm between Yepesian and Segovian approaches to artistry and pedagogy:

Fritz Buss on Romantic Depth vs Modernist Reproduction (“Words and Music,” Radio South Africa, 26 June 1987)

Buss’s description of artists who “never stop” — where “this process of learning, this process of advancement… goes on and on and on” — embodies precisely what Hans Blumenberg called “infinite progress” and Isaiah Berlin identified as Romantic “inexhaustibility.” When Buss asks of an artist “whether they’re still open… whether they are still progressing, or whether they have closed in” — “This is it… we cannot expect much more anymore” — he articulates the distinction between Yepes’s evolving artistry and what this essay has documented as Segovian/Modernist stasis.

Note especially Buss’s description of listening to Yepes’s recordings: “I listen once… then I can hear whether [the artist is] still open. That is to say, whether they are still progressing, or whether they have closed in.” This is the opposite of Stravinsky’s recording doctrine and Segovia’s demand that students copy recordings exactly. Buss listened to discern the direction of Yepes’s artistic evolution, not to find a fixed model to replicate. “From there on I do my own thing… You branch out like that, or you should, or it happens. It’s not a conscious thing. It happens.”

Fritz Buss on Classical Guitar Dogma and Teaching Individuals (“Words and Music,” Radio South Africa, 26 June 1987).

Buss’s rejection of dogmatic rules — “‘You must always have your hand like that.’ This is nonsense!” — and his testimony about students afraid to show their teachers innovations because “He might reject it and then I don’t get my paper” confirms the institutional enforcement mechanisms this essay has documented. Where Segovia created students who reproduced his interpretations, Buss sought to “create people other than myself that can play, so it begins to spread.”

His account of why he chose teaching over performing reveals the ethical dimension: “I thought, no, I have to create soldiers for the instrument. That is to say, I must create people other than myself that can play, so it begins to spread.” This is pedagogy as liberation — developing autonomous artists — not as what Attali called the “stars of repetition” producing “general leveling, the power elite excepted.”

Most revealing is Buss’s emphasis on beginners: “It’s the total beginner that keeps you in contact with how difficult it actually is. And it’s the total beginner that makes you look again and again at your method.” This is pedagogical humility grounded in ongoing discovery — the opposite of Segovia’s closed system of “stable truths” that students must accept without question. When Yepes told his students, “if I can’t answer your Why?, then what I’ve told you is no good,” and when Buss constantly revisited his method through teaching beginners, they embodied the principle that no pedagogical system is final or complete.

The contrast this 1987 radio broadcast documents represents the ideological divide at the heart of twentieth-century classical guitar culture: Modernist replication versus anti-Modernist development, closed systems versus inexhaustible exploration, institutional enforcement versus individual liberation, “stars of repetition” versus artists who “never stop.”

This wasn’t just theory. It worked.

Composer/guitarist Dietrich Wagner (1937–2007), one of Buss’s students, described his teacher’s approach in terms that echo Yepes’s own pedagogical philosophy:

“Fritz Buss is a man of infinite patience who will take endless pains to ensure that a pupil has clearly understood a particular point. I was always amazed by his ability to communicate his enthusiasm and love for the guitar, which is both reassuring and inspiring. Mr. Buss can also inspire and fascinate by his own playing on the guitar, thus demonstrating that the instrument can produce music on equal terms with any other instrument. … It is one of his qualities as a born teacher that Fritz Buss encourages his students to become individuals and to express themselves on the guitar in their own way. He is quick to spot a particular gift and to encourage a pupil to develop this ability to the full.” (Dietrich Wagner [1982] quoted in Fred Kazandjian, Fritz Buss and the Classical Guitar in South Africa, 1983: 62f)

“Encourages his students to become individuals and to express themselves on the guitar in their own way” — this single sentence encapsulates the pedagogical philosophy this essay has contrasted with Segovian authoritarianism. Where Segovia demanded students copy his “every inflection” and treated deviation as moral failure, the Yepesian lineage cultivated individual voices. Where Modernist pedagogy enforced conformity to fixed models, anti-Modernist pedagogy developed each student’s unique gifts.

The lineage is clear: Yepes’s rejection of copying Segovia’s recordings, his insistence that students “play like themselves,” his emphasis on discovering each student’s personality — these principles transmitted through Buss to some of his students, and beyond. The alternative existed. It worked. It still exists in those who learned to think for themselves rather than replicate approved models.

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The question remains: will classical guitar culture finally acknowledge what it systematically suppressed?

Fritz Buss performs Villa-Lobos’s Prelude no. 1 for the South African Broadcasting Corporation (c. late 1950s to early ’60s). Few of Buss’s recordings have survived — of the Prelude, only this restored excerpt, which was significantly damaged.

Buss alumnus Simon Wynberg performs Zani de Ferranti’s “Fantasie Variée sur la Romance d’Otello,” op. 7 (1987).

Buss alumni Simon Wynberg and David Hewitt perform Coste’s “Grand duo égales et concertantes” (1986).

Buss alumnus David Hewitt performs his composition, “Shebeen” (1992).

Buss alumni David Hewitt and Tessa Ziegler perform Hewitt’s “Shingwedzi” (1985).

Fritz Buss talks about Yepes’s 10-string guitar; Buss alumnus Viktor van Niekerk performs Servaud-Dickinson’s “Le sang d’Isolde” (from the documentary series “A Meeting of Minds” [forthcoming]).

[This essay presents documented evidence from primary sources. The full scope of this revisionist history — the complete correspondence, detailed pedagogical analyses, and acoustic measurements — remains to be systematically published.]

Further Reading:

Primary Historical Sources:

• BBC Radio 3, The Classical Guitar: Narciso Yepes, (July 13, 1974)
• Paul Carlton, “The Editor’s Corner,” Guitar Review 1, no. 4 (1947)
• Gabriel Estarellas, Entrevista a Narciso Yepes ([1990])
• Andrés Segovia, The Segovia–Ponce Letters (1989)
• Andrés Segovia, “More Strings?,” Guitar Review 39 (1974)
• Südwestfunks, TV-Kammerkonzert: Narciso Yepes (1973) [References are to this and this moment in the interview.]
• TVE, A Fondo: Andrés Segovia (1976)
• TVE, Grandes Intérpretes: Narciso Yepes (1971)
• Ignacio Yepes Szumlakowski, El archivo musical de Narciso Yepes: estudio, análisis y respuesta sonora de sus anotaciones manuscritas (2014)
• Narciso Yepes, Nexo entre las estructuras musicales y el ser humano (1978)
• Narciso Yepes, Ser instrumento (1989)

Theoretical Framework:

• Jacques Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music (1985)
• Zygmunt Bauman, “Dream of Purity,” Theoria 86 (1995)
• Isaiah Berlin, The Roots of Romanticism (1999)
• Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age (1983)
• Vladimir Jankélévitch, Music and the Ineffable (1961/1983)
• José Ortega y Gasset, The Dehumanization of Art; and other essays on art, culture, and literature (1925/1968)
• Richard Taruskin, The Danger of Music: And Other Anti-Utopian Essays (2008)
• Richard Taruskin, Text & Act: Essays on Music and Performance (1995)

Secondary Sources:

• Dalya Alberge, “John Williams says guitar maestro Andrés Segovia bullied students and stifled their creativity,” The Guardian (October 14, 2012)
• James Badal, “On Record: Christopher Hogwood,” Fanfare (Nov.–Dec. 1985)
• Leonardo Balada, “Stylistic Adventures” (n.d.)
• Leo Brouwer, “Bream y Yepes: disidentes de la era Segovia,” Clave 4, no. 1 (2002)
• Alejandro Bruzual, “Entrevista a Leonardo Balada” (2008)
• Colin Cooper, “Narciso Garcia Yepes (1927–1997),” Classical Guitar 15, no. 10 (1997)
• Salvatore Cosentino, “Fundamentally Sound: A Talk with Oscar Ghiglia,” Guitar Review 115 (1999)
• Fernando Díaz-Plaja, The Spaniard and the Seven Deadly Sins (1971)
• John W. Duarte [under the pseudonym “Discus”], “Guitar on Wax,” B.M.G. 53, no. 608 (December, 1955)
• John W. Duarte, “Two Recitals,” B.M.G. 58, no. 672 (April, 1961)
• Bruce Duffie, “Composer Leonardo Balada: A Conversation” (1998)
• Thor Eckert Jr., “Opera at Carnegie Hall?,” The Christian Science Monitor, (November 17, 1982).
• T. S. Eliot, The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism (1920)
• Bernard Gavoty, Andrés Segovia (1955)
• Matthew Hough, “Master Class with John Williams,” Guitar Review 131 (2005)
• Philip Hii, “A lesson with John Duarte” (2011)
• Charles M. Joseph, Stravinsky Inside Out (2001)
• Edmund L. King, “What Is Spanish Romanticism?,” Studies in Romanticism 2, no. 1 (1962)
• Allan Kozinn, “Narciso Yepes: Spanish Guitarist and Innovative Musician, (69),” Guitar Review 109 (1997)
• Albert F. Kunze, “John W. Duarte 1919–2004,” Soundboard 32, nos. 1 & 2 (2006)
• Marguerite Long, At the Piano with Debussy (1972)
• Ivor Mairants, “Narciso Yepes,” B.M.G. 58, no. 672 (April, 1961)
• Matthew Clayton Palmer, “The Use of A-M-I Scale Technique to Facilitate the Performance of Joaquín Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez,” (2012)
• Radio South Africa, “Words and Music: Fritz Buss” (June 26, 1987)
• Caroline Rae, “Henri Dutilleux and Maurice Ohana: Victims of an Exclusion Zone?”, Tempo 212 (2000)
• Joaquín Rodrigo, “Mi guitarrista,” El Mundo (May 4, 1997)
• David Russell, “Semley Sequences,” ([2013])
• Michael Saffle, “Yepes Delights Guitar Aficionados,” The Stanford Daily (November 6, 1973)
• Joe Saltzman, “Narciso Yepes: Life, Music Hung by a 10-String Guitar,” The Los Angeles Times, (October 22, 1982)
• John Schneider, “A Conversation with Narciso Yepes,” Soundboard 10, no. 1 (Spring, 1983)
• D. L. Shaw, “Towards the Understanding of Spanish Romanticism,” The Modern Language Review 58, no. 2 (1963)
• William Starling, Strings Attached: The life & Music of John Williams [Authorised Biography], (2012)
• Igor Stravinsky, An Autobiography (1936 [1963])
• Igor Stravinsky, Poetics of Music: In the Form of Six Lessons (1947)
• Igor Stravinsky, “Some Ideas About My Octuor” (1924 [in Weiss & Taruskin])
• F. Courtney Tarr, “Romanticism in Spain,” PMLA 55, no. 1 (1940)
• Pierre Vidal, “Rencontre avec Maurice Ohana et Narciso Yepes,” Musica (June, 1966)
• Graham Wade, “CD Review: Johann Sebastian Bach: Works for Guitar,” (2014)
• Graham Wade “Segovia — A Centenary Celebration: Part III — 1941–1947,” Classical Guitar 11, no. 8 (April, 1993)
• Graham Wade, “Segovia and the Spanish Character,” Classical Guitar 10, no. 1 (September, 1991)
• Graham Wade, Traditions of the Classical Guitar (1980)
• Graham Wade, “The Truth About Rodrigo’s ‘Concierto de Aranjuez’,” (July, 2015)
• Oliver Walker, “Letter to the Editor,” B.M.G. 58, no. 675 (July 1961)
• Piero Weiss & Richard Taruskin, Music in the Western World: A History in Documents (1984)
• Simon Wynberg, A Brief History of Multi-string Guitars from the Renaissance to the Present Day (1977)