CMS welcomes new music teacher

CENTERBROOK — Community Music School recently welcomed a new musician to its faculty: Francesco Barone, who will be teaching guitar, mandolin, banjo, and ukulele at the Centerbrook location.

Barone, an award winning guitarist, has performed throughout the Northeast United States and in Italy as a soloist and chamber musician. He has been presented at guitar festivals and societies including The Hartt School Guitar Festival, the Connecticut Guitar Society and the New England Guitar Society. Francesco was also included on a La Bella Strings sponsored concert in 2011 in which he was a featured artist. His performances have been broadcasted on National Public Radio.

In addition to traditional venues, Barone interacts with local communities where he resides in Connecticut and regularly performs outreach concerts at town libraries. He also connects with younger audiences by giving house concerts through the recent classical music startup Groupmuse.

In 2015 Barone presented “Nikita Koshkin: Three Compositional Styles for Flute and Guitar That are Unique Yet All Intrinsically Russian,” a lecture recital that explored the varied styles of Koshkin’s chamber music. The presentation serves as the genesis for his doctoral essay which explores Koshkin’s early chamber work, Sonata for Flute and Guitar (1982).

Barone received a Master of Music from and is a current DMA candidate at The Hartt School, University of Hartford where he studies under Professor Emeritus of Guitar Richard Provost. At Hartt Francesco was awarded the Graduate Teaching Fellowship in Guitar and performed with the prestigious 20/20 chamber ensemble. In addition, he holds a bachelor of music from Temple University in Guitar Performance where he studied with guitarist/composer Allen Krantz. While at Temple Francesco performed with the Temple University Opera in the award-winning production of Verdi’s Falstaff and was a prizewinner in the Philadelphia Classical Guitar Society Guitar Competition.

Barone has performed in numerous masterclasses with some of the world’s leading guitarists including Manuel Barrueco, Jason Vieaux, Oscar Ghiglia, Scott Tennant, Antigoni Goni, Andrew York, Ana Vidovic and Elena Papandreou. As a dedicated teacher, he has taught at Columbia University, Hartt School of Music and Capital Community College.

Community Music School offers innovative music programming for infants through adults, building on a 35-year tradition of providing quality music instruction to residents of shoreline communities. CMS programs cultivate musical ability and creativity and provide students with a thorough understanding of music so they can enjoy playing and listening for their entire lives. Learn more at visit www.community-musicschool.org or call 860-767-0026.