March 2010
Texas
First of all, at the beginning of March, I participated in the 9th Annual Texas Guitar Competition and Festival at the University of Texas at Dallas. I’m happy to say I won first prize! I had a lot of fun hanging out with some of my guitar friends from all over the country, and I also heard a great performance of the “Concierto de Los Angeles” by Shingo Fujii, performed by William Kanengiser with the Guitar Festival Orchestra. The link to the press release can be found here: http://www.utdallas.edu/ah/programs/arts/musi/guitarcomp.html
India
Immediately following that was an amazing tour of the south of India. I performed at a wedding, gave two concerts, and also taught masterclasses and private lessons in conjunction with the Bangalore School of Music. I also received some great reviews in the papers – an online version of one of the reviews can be found here:
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/59440/ensemble-east-west.html
Finally, check out this performance at the Bangalore International Centre I gave with incredible Indian musicians Muthu Kumar, Amith Nadig, Karthik Mani, and Ashwin Kumar during my visit. This was our second concert together, and it only happened because someone who saw our first concert loved it so much they had to have us perform again in Bangalore before I flew back to the states. I had a blast playing with these guys and hope to do more fusion and improvising with these guys in the future.
