Bob Denney Rob Goldsmith Romana Hartmetz Glen McCarthy
Bob Morris Ed Prasse Bill Purse Shelley Brobst Suzanne Shull
Past Chairs Emeritus: Nancy Marsters Will Schmid
Bob Denney is the Canadian Representative and Clinician for Teaching Guitar Workshops. He is currently the Head of Fine Arts and Technology at John McCrae Secondary School in Canada's capital city of Ottawa, Ontario. Prior to his 20 year teaching career Bob was a professional drummer in the pop and jazz field as well as performing as a percussionist with several orchestras in Ottawa, Toronto and Victoria, British Columbia. In addition, Bob has compositions for percussion published in the U.S and Canada. Bob is a former Vice-president of the Ontario Music Educators' Association and has delivered workshops on percussion, technology, pedagogy and guitar at OMEA conferences. Searching for a way to engage students not normally attracted to instrumental and vocal programs, Bob began one of the first guitar programs in the district, which is still thriving 15 years later. He introduced the guitar program at his current school just 6 years ago and now numbers more than 85 students studying at 4 levels of guitar. In 2007, the John McCrae Secondary School Guitar Ensemble was awarded the William Harvey Award for Best Small Ensemble in Canada by the Canadian Music Educators' Association. In 2007 the JMSS Guitar Ensemble was the opening act on the national broadcast of Music Monday organized by the Coalition For Music Education in Canada. In the fall of 2007 they were invited to open for gypsy jazz recording artists Van Django and less than a month later opened for finger style guitar virtuoso Doyle Dykes.
Rob Goldsmith has over twenty-five years of experience in guitar teaching and performance. He holds bachelor and master of music degrees in guitar performance from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, and has taught both private and group guitar on all levels from elementary school through community college. Rob currently is the guitar instructor at Rogich Middle School in Las Vegas, Nevada where he teaches150 students daily in beginning, intermediate, and advanced guitar classes. In addition, Rob is an active freelance guitarist in Las Vegas casino-hotels, and writes/edits guitar instruction materials for Mel Bay Publications and Warner Brothers Publications.
Romana Hartmetz holds the M.M. in Classical Guitar Performance from the University of Missouri, Kansas City, where she studied with recording artist Douglas Niedt. She received the Bachelor of Music degree from the University of North Texas and Music Education Certification from Central Missouri State University. She has performed in master classes with Pepe Romero and Christopher Parkening among other notable guitarists, and studied jazz guitar and arranging with Jack Petersen, John Elliot and Rick Whitehead. As a founding member of the MENC/GAMA/NAMM Guitar Task Force, she teaches summer workshops in guitar education throughout the country. She has written and edited pieces for guitar ensemble with Class Guitar Resources, Tallahassee, FL, FJH Publishing, Davie FL, and was co-author of the ASTA String Syllabus (Harp and Guitar edition). She has presented as a clinician for guitar education at the National MENC conventions in Kansas City Missouri, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Phoenix Arizona and at the Eastern Division Conference in Baltimore, MD. She has presented at numerous state music educator conventions in Missouri and Florida and has directed teacher in-service training in Virginia and Nevada. She was a clinician at the 2006 Mid-Atlantic Guitar Ensemble Festival in Reston, VA and adjudicated the 2007 Guitar Solo and Ensemble Festival in Prince George's County MD.
She is on the Guitar Curriculum Committee for Loudoun County VA, and serves as a mentor for many of the new guitar teachers in the county. Her teaching career spans elementary, middle school, high school and college levels. She currently directs the guitar program at Harmony Intermediate School in Loudoun County VA where over 15% of the student body is involved in guitar and over 45% involved in music. The program includes Level I, II and III guitar as well as The Gig, an auditioned ensemble, the Jazz Guitar Ensemble, and the Harmony Pickers a faculty, staff, & student Bluegrass etc… band, all of which perform frequently in the area. She lives in Purcellville, VA with her husband Sean who is a Band Director at Dominion High School. Their two children, Louis and Lillian attend Virginia Tech and Virginia Commonwealth Universities.
Nancy Marsters, teacher emeritus, holds the M.M. in Ethnomusicology from Florida State University and the B.M. From Willamette University, Salem, Oregon. She is author of H.O.T. (Hands 0n Teaching) two class guitar textbooks, and co-author (with Leo Welch) of a third volume. Other publications include a chapter in Promising Practices in High School General Music, from MENC, sacred choral works written for youth and several recorded and published pop pieces. She served as co-editor of the new MENC publication, Strategies for Teaching Guitar In Middle and High School. From 1977-1995 she built one of the finest high school guitar programs in the United States in the Tallahassee, Florida Public Schools. Nancy is widely known as a guitar clinician throughout the United States. Since her retirement from the classroom, she has focused on the work of the guitar task force.
Glen McCarthy retired from Fairfax County in 2006 after 30 years as the director of the guitar program at Robinson Secondary School. Under his direction, the Robinson Guitar Ensemble was consistently awarded superior ratings at adjudicated festivals. Robinson was the first recipient of the Guitar Accessories Manufacturers Association’s award to recognize innovative guitar programming in the United States. In the 2003-2004 school year, he was nominated for Fairfax County Teacher of the Year.
Mr. McCarthy has taught guitar methods, required for all music education majors at George Mason University, for over 20 years. He has been a guest clinician and adjudicator at festivals, conferences and clinics throughout Virginia and across the United States. He continues teaching at the educational center of the Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts. Over the summer, as a clinician for Teaching Guitar Workshops, he teaches workshops throughout the country.
Glen McCarthy is particularly proud that many of his students have gone on to enjoy successful music careers. Among those are Martha Masters who won the Guitar Foundation of America International Competition in 2000, Mike Schleibaum guitarist and Aaron Deal bassist in Darkest Hour, and Keith Owens and Michael Ward; both teaching high school guitar in Fairfax County Public Schools.
Mr. McCarthy graduated from West Virginia University with a bachelor of science in secondary education with an emphasis in music. Prior to teaching, he traveled internationally for many years with the band "Hickory Wind". He continues to perform in numerous venues and genres.
Bob Morris holds the Master of Music degree in Music Theory and the Bachelor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Oklahoma. A professional guitar player since the age of sixteen, Bob toured the southwest throughout much of the eighties with different rock bands, notably Pictures and Unleash The Dog. While on tour, he performed in concert with Kings X, Jake E. Lee, Cheap Trick, Randy Hanson, Pantera, and ICON. He has taught guitar at Rose State College in Midwest City, Oklahoma and at the Fine Arts Academy in Norman, Oklahoma. Bob currently teaches classroom guitar in Las Vegas for the Clark County School District. His guitar pilot program had over 150 beginning students in its first year and has since expanded to over thirty other schools in the district. He is the co-author of the CCSD class guitar curriculum, which includes teaching strategies and implements the National Standards for Music. In addition, Bob has written articles for the MENC publication "Music Makes the Difference - Programs and Partnerships", Guitar Shop Magazine, Guitar Player Magazine, and he has recorded an instructional CD for Notes On Call, a company that produces audio lessons for national guitar publications.
He has appeared in Fender's Frontline Magazine in an article entitled Guitar Thrives in Schools - Las Vegas Middle School's Guitar Education Program a Model for the Future. In March of 2000 Bob conducted the first ever guitar ensemble at a National meeting of the Music Educators National Conference in Washington D.C.. Bob was also granted the title Music Warrior in Music Inc., Magazine's summer 2000 NAMM issue for his outstanding contributions to Music Education. Recently, he was responsible for linking VH-1's Save The Music program to at-risk schools in the Clark County District in need of guitars. During the 2001 Western Regional Middle Level Conference in Las Vegas, Bob was presented the Sandra Babich Outstanding Teacher Memorial Award. Bob is a member of ASCAP, MENC, and ASTA, and he currently serves on the Guitar Task Force for the Revitalization of Guitar Education, an effort sponsored jointly by members of the Guitar and Accessories Marketing Association (GAMA), the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) and Music Educators National Conference (MENC).
Shelley Brobst has
been involved in music for most of her life. She holds a master's degree
of Educational Leadership from Northern Arizona University and a bachelor's
degree in Music Education with an emphasis in Guitar from the University
of Nevada, Las Vegas. She studied classical technique with Ricardo Cobo
and participated in masters classes with Angel Romero, Bruce Holzman and
Roland Dyens. Shelley has taught guitar at many levels. She started an
after-school program for under-privileged students at Sunrise Elementary
School in Las Vegas and her program at Molasky Junior High School grew
some of the top guitar students in the Clark County School District. Also,
while in Las Vegas, she adjudicated solo and ensemble competitions for
CCSD. Shelley taught guitar and band at Old Vail Middle School in Tucson,
AZ and served as K-8 Music Coordinator for the Vail School District. Shelley's
family recently relocated to the United Kingdom where she teaches elementary
music at Feltwell Elementary School. She hosts community guitar classes
and plays with the Cambridge Guitar Orchestra in England.
Bill Purse is a full professor, chair of the music technology and guitar departments at Duquesne University (Pittsburgh), where he was instrumental in the development of two new majors: music technology and sound recording technology. Purse received his bachelor of music and master of music at Duquesne University, as well as an EduCom (Education Communication) grant for study with Dr. Carol Lennox at Mills College for multimedia development in 1990. In addition, Purse has studied privately with Howard Massey at the Center for Electronic Music in New York, and with guitar virtuoso Pat Martino. Purse has received Duquesne University's 1996 Presidents award for excellence in scholarship and a 2001 Lifetime Achievement Award for guitar pedagogy and performance. He is also an honored member of the Lexington Who's Who.
Purse is the past chair of the MENC/NAMM/GAMA (Music Educators National Conference / National Association of Music Merchants / Guitar and Accessories Marketing Association) Guitar Task Force, which was created to revitalize the guitar in education. This very successful task force has retrained more than 1,200 teachers, who in turn have taught more than 280,000 young guitarists. Purse is also the editor of the MENC publication Strategies for Teaching Guitar in Middle and High School.
Purse has pioneered the use of interactive CD-ROMs, MIDI files, hard disk recording, and music score publication in classroom and private teaching at Duquesne University. He has specialized in developing accelerated courses for mastering the guitar, The Guitar Atlas and Basic Guitar Structures, and has written several books for the Warner Brothers, Ultimate Beginner Tech Start Series(tm): Home Recording Basics, Belwin's 21st Century Guitar Ensemble Arrangements for Europa and Classical Gas. In addition to co-writing Expressions Classroom Guitar Method with Aaron Stang. Purse is also the author of the highly acclaimed primer series for Coda Music's Finale family: The NotePad Primer, The PrintMusic! Primer and The Finale Primer published by Back Beat Publications. Purse has publish several guitar works with Mel Bay Publications including: Bach Chorale Guitar Ensemble Arrangements, Bach Chorale Sightreading Studies and one of his original jazz compositions Rainforest is featured in Mel Bay's Master Anthology of Jazz Solos Volume TwoAs an educational consultant for Fender Musical Instruments, Purse is a frequent and well-known lecturer and clinician on guitar synthesis and computer/MIDI applications for the guitar and classroom. As a composer, arranger, and producer in radio and television, Purse has produced and released several albums of original music, including Catch 22's Reappearance, Sly on Life, and Aergo's Free. He has toured worldwide with the synthesizer ensemble Aergo and is the producer, arranger, and guitarist/musical director for the Duquesne faculty guitar ensemble Catch 22. Purse has produced numerous critically acclaimed CDs such as: On Fire by Amanda Ford (Alanna Records), Rachmaninoff by Nissman Volume I & Rachmaninoff by Nissman Volume II artist Barbara Nissman (Pierian Recording Society), Mussorgsky -Songs and Dances of Death/Shostakovich Suite on Verses of Michelangelo Op. 145Guenko Guechev (Gega New/Bulgaria-Sony International), several tracks on Ken Karsh's Ventana (Alanna Records) and in addition released several albums of original music Counting By Eight (Ridgewood Studios), Catch 22's Reappearance, Sly on Life, and Aergo's Free (Pursestring Productions). He has toured worldwide with the synthesizer ensemble Aergo and is the producer, arranger, and guitarist/musical director for the Duquesne faculty guitar ensemble Catch 22.
Will Schmid, teacher emeritus, is past president of the 100,000-member MENC: The National Association for Music Education and professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. He holds a B.A. from Luther College and a Ph.D. from the Eastman School of Music. Will is a program author for Pearson Scott Foresman's 2002 and 2005 Silver Burdett Making Music series. He is the principal author of the best selling Hal Leonard Guitar Method (in ten languages) and over sixty other books/CDs/DVDs for guitar, banjo, and strings. Dr. Schmid is also the principal author/editor of an 8-volume high school choral textbook, Something New to Sing About (Glencoe/G. Schirmer) and a student text and teacher's guide entitled A Vision Shared: A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly (MENC). He has given workshops throughout the United States and in Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico and Europe. After a two-year $ 140,000 national pilot project in twenty schools nationwide, Dr. Schmid launched the World Music Drumming curriculum (included in Drumming Units of Making Music grades 6-8) which brings the excitement of African and Latin drumming and singing to schools throughout the United States.
Dr. Schmid is the recipient of the 1996 Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Eastman School of Music. In 2002 he was named a Lowell Mason Fellow by MENC and given the Distinguished Service Award from the Music Industry Conference (MIC).
During his presidency of MENC (1994-96), Dr. Schmid worked to reestablish the importance of active music making in schools and in America at large. MENC created new partnership initiatives in the areas of guitar, keyboards, strings, drumming, and singing as exemplified by the Get America Singing... Again! Campaign and the GAMA/NAMM/ MENC-sponsored Teaching Guitar workshops.
Suzanne Shull taught choral and general music full-time in metro Atlanta public schools for three decades. A believer in an eclectic and hands-on approach to general music, she began teaching guitar in general music classes in the mid 1970's. She found that playing guitar gave students a new attitude about required general music classes, and being a guitar teacher attracted more young men into her choirs.
As an active member of MENC since 1967, she has presented at many local and national conferences. In 1994 she worked on the specifications panel for the National Assessment of Educational Progress in the Arts that was administered in 1998. She was selected for the GMEA Distinguished Career Award in 2000 by her Georgia colleagues and as Teacher of the Year three times during her full-time service in Atlanta metro area schools.
Notable publications authored by Suzanne Shull include: "Exploring Music Together," General Music Today, 1987; Co-author and creator of Atlanta Symphony Orchestra's Listen! books (1990-1992); Contributing author to Principals and Practices in Middle Level Education (MENC,1994); Co-editor of Strategies in Teaching Middle School General Music, (MENC, 1997); What are We Doing in General Music? in Performing with Understanding, Edited by Bennett Reimer and published by MENC in 2000.
Edward Prasse holds the MME and BME degrees from the Florida State University College of Music. He currently heads the four-year guitar program at Leon High School in Tallahassee, Florida, which annually serves over 165 students across four levels of instruction. The program culminates in the auditioned performing guitar ensembles “Frets” and “Strings”, who has performed for the Governor of Florida, Justices of the Florida Supreme Court, the FMEA conference, numerous community and school performances. The Leon High Guitar program is driven by a multi-style approach studying all genres “from Bach to Rock”.
Ed is currently the General Music Committee Chairperson of the FMEA Executive board, which has recently offered a series of guitar-focused events within Florida including conference sessions, a state-wide ensemble festival, and a guitar All-State event. Additionally, Ed is a partner, co-author, and editor for the publishing company Class Guitar Resources, Inc. He is an active presenter/clinician for various state MEAs, and district training workshops. He and his wife Lisa are the proud parents of three young children 10, 8 and 5. In his spare time he enjoys playing golf, grilling great food, a bit of sleep, and PLAYING GUITAR!!