This album is a compilation of live concert, broadcast and studio performances, recorded in Paris and Washington. D.C.
Larry Snitzler gave his first classical guitar recital at age 18. Since then he has traveled to 20 countries, giving hundreds of performances of solo recital, concerto, and chamber music. He appears regularly at conservatories and international music festivals where, as well as performing, he gives classes and makes presentations in three languages.
Mr. Snitzler began studying the guitar with Sophocles Papas at age 16, after hearing a recording of Andrés Segovia. Three years later, Mr. Papas asked Segovia to listen to his pupil, following which the Spanish Maestro invited young Snitzler to attend his master classes at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Italy. Thus began a relationship that was to last some twenty-five years. For the next five years, Larry Snitzler was part of a small band of students who literally traveled the world to be a part of the special master classes offered by Andrés Segovia whenever, and wherever, he found time for them. (Among the other members of this group were to be found Carlos Barbosa-Lima, Oscar Ghiglia, Michael Lorimer, Aldo Minella, and Christopher Parkening.) During this same period, he also studied with the French guitar duo of Alexandre Lagoya and Ida Presti at the Académie d'Été, in Nice, France.
As a young man, Larry Snitzler moved to Paris, France for a period of eight years. There, he studied music theory and interpretation with Nadia Boulanger, and began to concertize throughout much of Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. While in Paris, he also studied with guitarist Oscar Ghiglia and composer Jean Catoire. He continued to benefit from the personal advice and counsel of Andrés Segovia, until the Maestro's death in 1987.
In 1986, he was invited to Los Angeles to give a concert in honor of Andrés Segovia, as part of a special celebration for the 93 year-old artist who was giving master-classes at the University of Southern California.
Larry Snitzler was a founding member of The Washington Guitar Quintet, a group specializing in North and South American and Jazz-oriented music. Over time, other members included: Charlie Byrd, Carlos Barbosa-Lima, John Marlow, Phillip Mathieu, Jeffrey Meyerriecks and Myrna Sislen.
Mr. Snitzler has premiered or been the dedicatee of works by Gilbert Biberian, Stephen Douglas Burton, Jeffrey Meyerriecks, Guido Santorsola, Glenn Smith and Ralph Turek. Mr. Snitzler's own compositions have been described as, "beautifully formed, immediately attractive music," by Joseph McLellan, chief music critic for the Washington Post.
He was long associated with National Public Radio as an on-air host, performer and freelance music producer of various programs and series such as Guitar Notebook, Concert Guitar with Larry Snitzler, and ¡SEGOVIA! (Now part of the collection of the Museum of Broadcasting.) He is a former contributing editor of, and has written extensively for, the prestigious Guitar Review. His writing occasionally appears in other national and international music journals as well. He is a former co-chair of the Music Advisory Panel of the National Endowment for the Arts, has been a music consultant to the National Gallery of Art and an adjudicator for the Concours International de La Guitare, sponsored by Radio France. He has lectured extensively at the Smithsonian Institution, and has appeared at the National Press Club, as well as the Sunday at the Met lecture series, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
Recordings: Blue Lula, Concord Concerto labels.
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A Few Words from the Critics..
"Where virtuosity was demanded....it was produced brilliantly."
Jos. McLellan, The Washington Post
"Snitzler has inherited an unforced musicality and elegance of phrasing from his teacher, Segovia."
Ch. McCardell, The Washington Post
"Snitzler impressed everyone with his relaxed, effortless technique and his lyrical approach to Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's Guitar Concerto, Opus 99."
The Fairfax Journal, Great Falls, Va.
"Superb...expertly played."
Arlington Daily News, Arlington, Tx.
"Extraordinary...sensitive and expressive."
El Correo de Andalucía, Seville
"Remarquable!" Pariscope, Paris
"A musicality made of purity, finesse and facility, which reveals an authentic musical temperament and culture..."
Dépèche du Midi, Montpellier
"Magnifico!" El Dia, Honduras
"The artist is obviously gifted, and brings forth beautiful and extraordinary effects from his instrument."
El Alam, Tunisia
"The public wildly applauded Monsieur Snitzler's playing throughout his recital."
Le Courrier de Madagascar
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