In 1985 he won First Prize in the Dallas Chamber Orchestra Concerto Competition and has judged the Guitar Foundation of America (GFA) International Competitions in Quebec City, Canada, St. Louis, Missouri, San Antonio, Texas and Montréal, Canada. In 2006 he served on the jury of the 14th International Guitar Competition at Fundacíon Alirio Díaz in Carora, Venezuela, where he also performed a lecture/concert on classical & jazz crossover at the home of Maestro Díaz. Four years earlier he presented a similar class at Encuentro Antonio Lauro in Santa Ana, Venezuela. He has been invited to present numerous masterclasses and lecture demonstrations at prestigious universities such as Arizona State University, the Juilliard School in New York, Alaska Pacific University and at the GFA.
He has studied with or performed in master classes for several of the world’s foremost guitarists including Andrés Segovia, Oscar Ghiglia, Pepe Romero, Robert Guthrie and José Tomás. He received full scholarships to Southern Methodist University on the recommendation of Robert Guthrie and to the Aspen Music Festival on the recommendation of Oscar Ghiglia. In the summers of 1980-82 he had both classes and private lessons with the great Spanish composer Federico Moreno-Torroba. Blues master Stevie Ray Vaughn, a regular in the McGuire family music room in the early 1970s, taught Chris to play the blues in weekly jam sessions.
Chris taught for 25 years at several colleges and universities including the University of Dallas and North Lake College. He now devotes most of his time performing, conducting the artistic activities of the FWCGS and the AGSD and spending time with his family.
Mak Grgic
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At 25, Mak GRGIC was recently hailed by the Washington Post as "a lyrical insightful player …as playing with "beauty" and "intelligence," calling his interpretations nuanced and introspective." Critic Stephen Brookes proclaimed his performance of Weiss’s Passacaglia in D Major a "high point of the evening" offering "a superb, finely detailed reading that showed Grgic is a guitarist to keep an eye on."
Mak has been invited to venues worldwide, including the Sandpoint Festival with the Spokane Symphony, the Allegro Guitar Series in Texas, the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., the Newman Center for the Performing Arts, Denver, in performance with the Assad Brothers and cello super-star Joshua Roman for Strings on Fire, Strathmore Hall in North Bethesda, MD, Pepperdine University as a guest of Christopher Parkening, Portland Classical Guitar, Guitar Festival Mikulov, Piran Music Nights and The Sounds of Six Strings, Cankarjev Dom, Slovenia. As a new Young Artist in Residence at Da Camera Society of Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles, he will appear with JACK Quartet in the premiere of a new work by composer and member of the Philip Glass Ensemble, David Crowell, and in recitals with the young, brilliant cellist Jeremiah Campbell.
He has performed at the Grande Auditorium di Espinho, Espinho and Teatro di Fafe, Fafe Municipality in Portugal, Teatro Cervantes de Bejar, Salamanca, Castile-Leon in Spain, International Music Council of the European Broadcasting Union in an all instrument "New Talent" Competition in Bratislava, representing the Republic of Slovenia, and a performance with RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra and Maestro Ivo Lipanovic - Gallus Hall, Cankarjev Dom, Ljubljana, Slovenia, The Dallas Opera with Chamber Orchestra in performances of Peter Maxwell Davies' The Lighthouse, the Lancaster Festival in Ohio, where he performed Rodrigo's Fantasia para un Gentilhombre, conducted by Gary Sheldon, conductor of the Miami City Ballet. Other dates include performances with the renowned JACK Quartet where they premiered a new guitar quintet by the most distinguished of young Slovenian composers, Nina Senk, as well as the Croatian Chamber Philharmonic in Europe and at the "Musica a 4 Stelle" summer festival in Grado, Italy, the Guitar Festival at William Patterson University in New Jersey, St. Donat's Church in Zadar, Croatia, and the Atrium of the City Museum of Ljubljana, Slovenia. He has been reviewed and interviewed around the world by magazines, newspapers and radio stations such as KPBX in Spokane, Washington, UNIVOX and National Radio in Slovenia, National TV and Radio in Croatia, Thüringische Landeszeitung in Germany, Jutarnji List in Croatia, the popular family magazine Jana in Slovenia, Columbus Dispatch in Ohio, Classical Guitar Magazine in the UK and Il Messaggero and Chitarra Classica in Italy and The Washington Post.
Source: Christopher McGuire and Mak Grgic Websites |