Guitar Week, July 27-August 2, 2025
Guitar Week 2025 Catalog Section
Coming off last summer’s touching memorial to the late Al Petteway , who led this pioneering program for years, coordinator Greg Ruby continues to build on the legacy of Al in forging a a one-of-a-kind workshop experience that salutes the amazingly versatile sounds and techniques of the acoustic guitar. The staff for 2025 includes Howard Alden (jazz), Steve Baughman (fingerstyle and clawhammer guitar), Ray Chesna (music theory for guitar), Jake Eddy (bluegrass), Albanie Faletta (fingerstyle), Sam Farthing (Django jazz), Cesar Garabini (Brazilian), Danny Knicely (bluegrass), Christie Lenée (fingerstyle tapping), Adam Levy (jazz and improvisation), Tony McManus (Celtic), Mamie Minch (blues and vocals), Cory Seznec (fingerstyle), Jon Shain (slide guitar and blues ), Jamie Stillway (fingerstyle), and Rev. Heng Sure (performance). Stay tuned for who will be showcasing as part of Guitar Week’s Luthiers Exhibit!
Since 1991, the Swannanoa Gathering’s Guitar Week has brought together a world-class staff of teaching artists and dedicated students to the beautiful setting of the Blue Ridge Mountains for a week of classes, concerts, and jamming. Removed from the pressures and schedules of everyday life, participants are immersed in what one student has called “guitar utopia.” Providing exceptional guitar instruction within a variety levels, genres, and traditions, Guitar Week will help you grow as a musician in a supportive community of acoustic guitar lovers, many of whom will become lifelong friends. Students enroll in as many as three regular classes during the week, and every afternoon following lunch features a larger “seminar class” with different panels from the teaching staff involved each day to play a little, discuss what goes into their music-making, and answer questions. The evenings are highlighted by dazzling faculty performances and following those, informal jamming that often goes late into the night. With classes in blues, swing, bluegrass, bossa nova, jazz, Celtic, composition, theory, flatpicking, percussive, and fingerstyle, there is truly something for everyone. Guitar Week also runs concurrently with the Contemporary Folk Week workshops and students may take classes from either program.