Expert of the Month: Dr. Michael Quantz

Dr. Michael Quantz is a nationally recognized and leading advocate for guitar education. He is the recipient of the University of Texas System Regents' Outstanding Teaching Award and the University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College President's Outstanding Teaching Award and he serves as the Director of Education for the Guitar Foundation of America (GFA). He has presented clinics for numerous school districts, the GFA and the Texas Music Educators Association Conference (the world's largest music teacher conference). He has many years of experience in performance adjudication, having judged the prestigious GFA International Artist Competition, the University of Texas at Dallas Classical Guitar Competition, the Beatty Competition (Washington, DC), and many University Interscholastic League contests. In addition, he was the creator and director of the GFA's International Youth Competition and Guitar Ensemble Showcase.

After receiving a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in guitar performance from the University of North Texas, he directed the Guitar Studies and Estudiantina programs at the Lopez Fine Arts Academy in Brownsville, Texas. Under his leadership, this program grew into one of the largest competitive high school guitar programs in the United States. During his tenure at Lopez, the College Board and the J. Paul Getty Trust selected him as the Site Coordinator for a multi-year project entitled: The Role of the Arts in the High School Curriculum.

Dr. Quantz has been a respected and sought after classical guitar teacher for over 30 years. He has enjoyed notable success developing the guitar division at the University of Texas at Brownsville/Texas Southmost College into a dynamic, award-winning, and highly respected program that is recognized as one of the best in the United States. His students have distinguished themselves individually as top prize winners in the Eastfield Collegiate Competition, Houston's Classical Minds Festival, the UT Pan Am Competition, and also as top ten performers in the UT-Dallas Texas Solo Guitar Competition and the Corpus Christi Young Artists Competition in a group representing the world's top music conservatories. Under his direction the UTB/TSC Guitar Orchestra was twice featured on the internationally syndicated "Guitar Alive!" show on National Public Radio. He is also the creator/director of the Brownsville Annual Guitar Ensemble Festival and Competition which draws participants from all over the nation.

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