Tommy Emmanuel, CGP

Two-time GRAMMY nominee Tommy Emmanuel CGP is one of the world’s most respected musicians. With a professional career spanning five decades, Tommy has garnered hundreds of thousands of loyal fans worldwide.

His unusual talent and life are common lore in Australia: born into a musical family, Tommy got his first guitar at age 4 and was taught by his mother. He quickly learned by ear, with no formal instruction, and has never read music. By age 6 he was working as a professional musician in the family band (variously named The Emmanuel Quartet, The Midget Surfaries and The Trailblazers). By the age of 10, young Tommy had already played his way across Australia.

In the 1970s, Tommy was in high demand as a session player and sideman: he played on recordings for Air Supply, Men at Work and dozens of other popular bands and artists, as well as thousands of commercial jingles and tunes. Some of his most notable appearances were on the Air Supply hit singles “Lost in Love,” “All Out of Love,” “Every Woman in the World,” and “Now and Forever.” Tommy soon became known as one of the best modern guitarists in Australia. In 1985 he joined one of the decade’s biggest Australian rock bands, Dragon, and recorded the platinum-selling album Dreams of Ordinary Men. It is for his successful solo career, however, that Tommy is best known.

In the 1980s, Tommy finally met and got to play with his hero, Chet Atkins, in Nashville, TN. From that magical moment forward, Atkins took him under his wing, and the influences are evident throughout Tommy’s music: in his personal philosophy, technical precision, virtuosic improvisations and unusually broad repertoire (encompassing not only country and bluegrass, but pop, jazz, blues, gospel, even classical, flamenco, and aboriginal styles). Tommy speaks of his mentor with the love and gratitude of a son, and his dream of recording with Chet Atkins came true in 1996 when the pair made an album titled “The Day The Finger Pickers Took Over The World” for which Tommy received his first GRAMMY award nomination.

Chet honored Tommy with the title of “Certified Guitar Player” (CGP) for his contribution to guitar music, a very rare distinction shared by only four other people in the world. After an amazing performance with his brother Phil at the Sydney Olympic Games Closing Ceremony, the world wanted to know who this mysterious Australian guitar virtuoso was. In 2001, Tommy released his first solo-acoustic album, ONLY and his popularity has grown by leaps and bounds aided by a non-stop touring schedule and increasing exposure in the media.

His album The Mystery earned him another GRAMMY nomination, and in 2008 Guitar Player Magazine and Acoustic Guitar Magazine named him Best Acoustic Guitarist and Gold Medalist in the in the Readers’ Choice and Players’ Choice Awards. Guitar Player’s 2010 Readers Choice awards named him Best Acoustic Guitarist for the second time.

Tommy Emmanuel is an honorary Kentucky Colonel, a CGP (Certified Guitar Player), an Order of Australia Medalist (AM) and the holder of both an honorary Masters Degree (MA) and more recently an honorary Doctor of Arts (DR) from Charles Sturt University in Australia in recognition of his commitment to rural Australia and his contribution to music education.

Al Di Meola

AL DI MEOLA is among the top guitarists of our time. His ongoing fascination with complex rhythmic syncopation combined with provocative lyrical melodies and sophisticated harmony has been at the heart of his music throughout a celebrated career that has spanned four decades and earned him critical accolades, four gold albums, two platinum albums, more than six million in record sales worldwide, five German gold albums, and various awards including an Honorary Doctorate Degree from Berklee College of Music, the Honorary Miles Davis Award presented by the Montreal Jazz Festival, a BBC Lifetime Achievement Award presented by Sir George Martin in 2008, Hungarian Foundation for Performing Arts Lyra Award, and numerous Grammy nominations and awards. Al is the recipient of the most prestigious guitar awards ever given, a total of 12 awards from Guitar Player Magazine polls and as a result, has been inducted into their Gallery of Greats.

A bona fide guitar hero, and prolific composer, he has amassed over 30 albums as a leader while collaborating on a dozen or so others with the likes of the fusion supergroup Return to Forever (with Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Lenny White), the celebrated acoustic Guitar Trio featuring fellow virtuosos John McLaughlin and Paco de Lucia, and the Rite of Strings trio with bassist Clarke and violinist Jean-Luc Ponty. And while his dazzling technique on both acoustic and electric guitars has afforded him regal status among the hordes of fretboard fanatics who regularly flock to his concerts, the depth of Di Meola’s writing along with the soulfulness and the inherent lyricism of his guitaristic expression have won him legions of fans worldwide beyond the guitar aficionado set.

A pioneer of blending world music and jazz, going back to early Latin-tinged fusion outings like1976’s Land of the Midnight Sun, 1977’s Elegant Gypsy and 1978’s Casino, the guitar great continues to explore the rich influence of flamenco, tango, Middle Eastern, Brazilian and African music with his World Sinfonia, an ambitious pan-global group that he formed in 1991. Their exhilarating world music fusion has been documented on such releases as 2000’s The Grande Passion (featuring the Toronto Symphony Orchestra), 2007’s Live in London, 2011’s Pursuit of Radical Rhapsody and the stunning 2012 DVD, Morocco Fantasia (recorded at the Mawazine Festival in Rabat, Morocco and featuring special guests Said Chraibi on oud, Abdellah Meri on violin and Tari Ben Ali on percussion).

Growing up in Bergenfield, NJ with the music of The Ventures and The Beatles, Di Meola naturally gravitated to guitar as a youngster and by his early teens was already an accomplished player. Attaining such impressive skills at such a young age didn’t come easy for Al, but rather was the result of focused dedication and intensive periods of woodshedding between his junior and senior years in high school. “I used to practice the guitar all night after school and once in college, 6 – 8 hours per day” he told Down Beat. “And I was trying to find myself, or find the kind of music that suited where I was going with the guitar.”

His earliest role models in jazz included guitarists Tal Farlow and Kenny Burrell. But when he discovered Larry Coryell, whom Al would later dub “The Godfather of Fusion,” he was taken with the guitarist’s unprecedented blending of jazz, blues and rock into one seamless vocabulary on the instrument. “I used to ride the bus from New Jersey to see him at little clubs in Greenwich Village,” he recalls. “Wherever he was playing, I’d be there.” In 1972, Al enrolled at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and by the second semester there began playing in a fusion quartet led by keyboardist Barry Miles. When a gig tape of that band was later passed on to Chick Corea by a friend of Al’s in 1974, the 19-year-old guitarist was tapped to join Corea’s fusion supergroup Return to Forever as a replacement for guitarist Bill Connors. After three landmark recordings with Return to Forever — 1974’s Where Have I Known You Before, 1975’s Grammy Award winning No Mystery and 1976’s Romantic Warrior — the group disbanded and Al subsequently started up his career as a solo artist. His 1976 debut as a leader, Land of the Midnight Sun, was a blazing showcase of his signature chops and Latintinged compositions that featured a stellar cast including drummers Steve Gadd and Lenny White, bassist Anthony Jackson and Jaco Pastorius, keyboardists Jan Hammer, Barry Miles and Chick Corea and percussionist Mingo Lewis. Over the course of six more albums with Columbia Records – Elegant Gypsy, Casino, Splendido Hotel, Electric Rendezvous, Tour De Force and Scenario – Al established himself as an influential force in contemporary music. 1980 marked the triumph of the acoustic guitar trio with Paco De Lucia and John McLaughlin. Their debut recording on Columbia Records, Friday Night in San Francisco, became a landmark recording that surpassed the four million mark in sales. The three virtuosos in the trio toured together from 1980 through 1983, releasing the studio album Passion, Grace & Fire in 1982. In 1995, they reunited for a third recording, Guitar Trio, follow by another triumphant world tour.

In early 1996, Di Meola formed a new trio with the violinist Jean-Luc Ponty and RTF bandmate Stanley Clarke called The Rite of Strings. Their self-titled debut was released in 1995. Di Meola subsequently recorded with the likes of opera superstar Luciano Pavarotti, pop stars Paul Simon, classical guitarist Manuel Barrueco, and Italian pop star Pino Daniele. Over the course of his career, he has also worked and recorded with Phil Collins, Carlos Santana, Steve Winwood, Wayne Shorter, Tony Williams, Herbie Hancock, Milton Naciemento, Egberto Gismonti, Stevie Wonder, Les Paul, Jimmy Page, Steve Vai, Frank Zappa and Cuban pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba.

Di Meola’s 2013 release “All Your Life” recorded at Abbey Road Studios was an acoustic tour de force that had him revisiting the music of a seminal influence – The Beatles. “I really credit the Beatles for the reason why I play guitar,” he says. “That was a major catalyst for me to want to learn music, so their impact was pretty strong.” A virtual one-man show of virtuosity, it features the guitar great interpreting 14familiar Beatles tunes in the stripped-down setting of strictly acoustic guitar.

In 2015 he released Elysium, which finds the guitar great blending the lush tones of his nylon string Conde Hermanos acoustic prototype model and a ’71 Les Paul electric (his Return to Forever and Elegant Gypsy axe) in a collection of songs that are at once invigorating and alluring. “It represents a new composition phase for me, whereby the writing became, in a sense, my therapy during a challenging personal transition in my life,” he said. In the same year he was honored as the 22nd recipient of the Montreal Jazz Festival’s Miles Davis Award, created in 1994 to honor a great international jazz musician for the entire body of his or her work and for that musician’s influence in regenerating the jazz idiom.

2018 marked a new era for Al Di Meola: His first of six signed projects with German record label Ear Mmusic, “OPUS” was released in March. The Grammy award winning virtuoso says: “With Opus I wanted to further my compositional skills as I think that the evolution of this part of my persona has labeled me more composer/guitarist than guitarist/composer. For the first time in my life, I have written music being happy, I’m in a wonderful relationship with my wife, I have a baby girl and a beautiful family that inspires me every day. I believe it shows in the music.”

A retrospective of Al Di Meola’s nearly 50 year acclaimed career is expressed through his latest Ear Music release of March 2020 “ACROSS THE UNIVERSE” with his virtuosic arrangements and creative interpretations of 14 Beatles songs with a larger scale full production featuring orchestrations balanced with lavish acoustic arrangements and electric guitar.

Current work includes an autobiography and a new solo guitar record of new music. Al is also very proud to announce the upcoming April 2022 release of “Saturday Night in San Francisco” from the 1980 tour of the Guitar Trio with John McLaughlin and the late Paco de Lucia.

Guthrie Govan

English guitarist Guthrie Govan is widely considered one of the most complete players alive. He is equally at home in rock, jazz, funk, and fusion. He is best known for the instrumental trio The Aristocrats, for his work with Steven Wilson, and for his role in Hans Zimmer’s film and live projects. His solo debut Erotic Cakes remains a touchstone for serious players, and his clarity as a teacher is nearly as celebrated as his playing.

Martin Taylor, MBE

Multi-award-winning musician Dr. Martin Taylor, MBE, is a virtuoso guitarist, composer, educator and musical innovator whom Acoustic Guitar magazine calls ‘THE Acoustic Guitarist of his Generation’.

Widely considered to be the world’s foremost exponent of solo jazz and fingerstyle guitar playing, Martin possesses an inimitable style that has earned him global acclaim from fellow musicians, fans and critics alike. He dazzles audiences with a signature style that artfully combines his virtuosity, emotion and humor with a strong, engaging stage presence.

Taylor has enjoyed a remarkable musical career spanning across five decades, with more than 100 recordings to his credit. Completely self-taught beginning at the early age of 4, he has invented and developed a unique way of playing the guitar that is greatly admired, and often emulated, by guitarists all over the world.

In addition to his solo concerts and recordings, he has also collaborated with musicians from many different musical genres, including: Jeff Beck, Tommy Emmanuel, Bill Wyman, Chet Atkins, Stephane Grappelli, David Grisman, George Harrison, Jamie Cullum, Bryn Terfel, Dianne Schuur and Gary Burton.

Taylor brings a rich and varied musical heritage to his play, to the extent that Tommy Emmanuel remarked that [Taylor] is “a portal into all that came before.”
Over his stellar career, Taylor has amassed a record 14 British Jazz Awards as a guitarist. Several of his albums have been in the Top 10 in the USA and Europe.

From his many world tours and recordings in the 1980’s with jazz violin legend Stephane Grappelli, to performing solo at New Yorks’ Carnegie Hall and London’s Royal Albert Hall, to composing music for Japanese TV, being a pioneering founder of an online interactive guitar school in California, and teaching at his highly acclaimed Martin Taylor Guitar Retreats around the world, he’s undeniable proof that music has no boundaries.

Joscho Stephan

Germany’s Joscho Stephan is one of the leading voices in modern Gypsy swing. Rooted in the tradition of Django Reinhardt, he pairs blistering right-hand technique with a deep sense of melody, and stretches the style into Latin, classical, and pop repertoire without losing its fire. On stage he is equal parts showman and scholar, and few players explain the mechanics of Gypsy jazz as clearly.

Ulf Wakenius

Swedish guitarist Ulf Wakenius spent roughly a decade as the guitar chair in Oscar Peterson’s quartet, one of the most demanding seats in jazz. He has also recorded and toured with Ray Brown, and has built a long solo catalog blending bebop fluency with Scandinavian lyricism. His playing is swinging, harmonically rich, and warm, the sound of a musician who learned at the very top.

Peter Honoré

Born in Denmark and handed a guitar at age 11, Pete Honoré sharpened his natural ability at a music academy in Copenhagen, then spent more than 20 years as a touring session guitarist behind artists including Tom Jones, Lionel Richie, and Nicole Scherzinger. Known worldwide as “Danish Pete,” he joined Andertons in 2015 as YouTube Manager and helped grow the channel past 620,000 subscribers in a few years. Today he focuses on inspiring people to play through masterclasses, videos, and backing tracks.