Six course Spanish guitar and Salvador Castro de Gistua

[Martyn Hodgson]

Castro de Gistua seems a shadowy figure active in the late eighteenth century. Much of his work was published in Paris contained in the series 'Journal de Musique Etrangere' but there are other Paris publications too. I've also seen title pages of a few works published in Spain (presumably earlier?).

Much of these published works reflect a strong Spanish idiom (includes Fandango etc) and I'm now presuming he played the six course Spanish guitar rather than the single string Italian inspired instrument which became popular, and indeed general, later in France. He also seems to have introduced the Spanish style of guitar music to France. But all this is pure speculation and I'd be grateful for any firmer biographical and other details about the man and his music, including things like: place of birthplace, precise dates, family background; teacher (Padre Basilio perhaps); move to Paris, etc

His dates seem to be c.1770 to after 1800 (some suggest after 1831- though this may simply reflect dates of posthumous publications).

And any information about even more shadowy (at least to me) characters would also be welcome, such as: Antonio Abreu (c. 1750 - 1788, or after 1820); Isidro de Laporta (fl. c 1790); 

MH

PS I'm putting this on the General discussion site since 'Early Romantic Guitar' doesn't seem to fit this music!