Guitarist Andrew Leonard to Play Milford Center for the Arts

New England Guitar Society opens its International Guest Guitarist series with Andrew Leonard on Saturday, November 11 at 8 PM at the Milford Center for the Arts, 40 Railroad Avenue South, Milford.

Originally from Connecticut, guitarist Andrew Leonard is a rising star performer who received critical acclaim from major American publications such as the Soundboard, Portland Phoenix and Northeast Performer. He has released two CDs to critical acclaim and in his NEGS season opener concert, he will present a creative program of original classical guitar music by Carver Blanchard, Andrew York, Carlo Domeniconi and Francisco Tarrega, as well as arrangements from Leo Kottke, Bach, Albeniz and more.

Leonard Will also give a master-class on Sunday November 12, at the Milford Center for the Arts at 2:00 pm. For tickets, $20 ($15 MAC Members, $18 Seniors, free for 15 or younger) go to www.milfordarts.org or call 203-878-6647.

NEGS guest guitarist series will continue on Saturday March 10, 2018 with Armenian guitarist Gohar Vardanyan and on Saturday April 14, 2018 with Argentine guitarist Carlos Pavan. The season will close on Friday May 11, 2018 with its traditional fundraising concert this year featuring The Yale School of Music Guitar Department, under the direction of Benjamin Verdery. For details about the season please visit www.newenglandguitar.org.

The New England Guitar Society is established to create a nurturing environment for classical guitarists to meet, share ideas, perform, compose, teach and grow as musicians. Our goal is to increase the public interest in classical guitar, to ultimately create future players and audiences.

Classical Guitarist Andrew Leonard has been called a "guitar phenomenon" by the Portland Phoenix (Maine). His playing has been referred to as "spirited and convincing" in Soundboard Magazine and "inspiring...effortless style" in Northeast Performer. Andrew's concert schedule has taken him throughout the country, from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine and to Europe. As a young artist, at age 26, Andrew's D.C area debut performance at Strathmore Hall was sold out, months in advance. He spent the Millennium performing in Geneva, Switzerland.

Andrew Leonard has two solo recordings, A World of Guitar Music and Music of the Ages. His debut recording, Music of the Ages was featured as release of the month on WGTS radio in Maryland and both recordings have received airplay throughout the country on National Public Radio affiliates. Andrew is an endorsee for the D'Addario String company and Northampton, MA menswear shop Jackson & Connor.

Since 2000, Andrew performed with Grammy Award winning acoustic finger-style guitarist, Doug Smith. The genre defying Leonard and Smith Guitar Duo performed in a variety of traditional and non-traditional settings from concerts halls and music festivals to house concerts in the wine country of Washington state and by the beach in Cape Cod, MA. In 2015 they released their first recording Guitar Duo.

Andrew grew up in Connecticut graduating from Hamden High School and as a graduate student attended the Yale School of Music with a scholarship from the Yale Club of New Haven. After graduating from Yale, Andrew taught at Wesleyan University, Neighborhood Music School in New Haven and Tabor Arts Center in Branford. Many of his first performances, in his teens and early 20's, were given in the New Haven area. His last solo performance in the area was over 5 years ago.

As an instructor at the college level, Andrew Leonard ran the guitar program at the University of Kentucky and taught at Wesleyan University. At the National Guitar Workshop and the Crown of the Continent Guitar Festival, he co-taught week long programs with Scott Tennant, David Leisner, Benjamin Verdery and Dennis Koster.

Andrew has Suzuki and Childbloom Guitar training to teach children as young as 4. Currently, Andrew is a faculty member of the Northampton Community Music Center where he teaches Suzuki and Classical Guitar students. Andrew also uses Skype to teach guitarists from all over the world. He is the creator of the instructional video Classical Guitar for the Blues, Rock & Jazz Player available at TrueFire.com.

Andrew received his first guitar when he was twelve. At age sixteen, after studying jazz and rock guitar for four years, he began studying classical guitar. A year later, he received an award from the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts for his classical guitar playing. His studies culminated in a Master of Music Degree from Yale University where he was the recipient of the Rosoff Award and was a Yale Club of New Haven Fellow.

For more information, visit www.andrew-leonard.com.

To post a comment, you must register and login.