The Deer Hunter was a 1978 movie starring Robert De Niro, John Cazale, John Savage, Christopher Walken and Meryl Streep, among others.

I have never seen the movie, however I have heard the Shadows rendition of “Cavatina” – the theme from the movie. I remember watching them play it as an interlude while Cliff Richard “counted money” at a live show they did together. I remember listening and enjoying how it flowed, and wished I could play it.

Being a guitarist, I looked up the tabs and gave it a try. It was an abominable failure, as it was beyond my abilities at the time. That version still is, but I found a backing track and learned how to play it in the same way the Shadows did and have been practicing on and off for the last couple of days. Today I recorded it – not the way I would have liked to, but I tried yesterday to make it work as a multi-track and couldn’t, so I played along with it and recorded it all as one track. It still doesn’t sound perfect, aside from a couple of slide mistakes (and a missed fret once) I think the guitar is slightly off tune compared to the track. It will suffice for now until I can record a better version some time.

I’ve uploaded an MP3 at http://rizzo.i-al.net/~zeke/Cavatina.mp3 for your ear-bleeding pleasure 😉

UPDATE: Credit where credit is due (I had this in my orignal post but it wasn’t saved etc etc..) – the backing track came from http://goran.tangring.com/index-filer/backings.htm