Joseph Pecoraro

Concert and recording artist Joseph Pecoraro has been heralded as one of the most exciting and expressive classical guitarists of his generation.  He appears as soloist, chamber musician, and with orchestra in recitals across the United States and abroad, and his performances have received widespread recognition and awards.  Recent seasons’ schedules feature concerts in France, Italy Switzerland, Mexico, and over a dozen U.S. states, including solo recitals at the Kennedy Center, the Washington Library, and the Chicago Cultural Center.  These include appearances in Houston, Denver, Minneapolis, Chicago, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Raleigh, Miami, New York, Charlotte, Charleston, and Washington D.C.  He has performed as featured soloist with the Roanoke, Wintergreen Music Festival, and Winston-Salem Symphony Orchestras, numerous vocal ensembles, and has collaborated with dozens of prominent singers and instrumentalists.

Pecoraro is featured frequently on radio and television broadcasts. His recordings include major works by Domeniconi, Ponce, Hirsh, Bach, Merlin, and others. Pecoraro’s most-recent CDs include ‘Perennials’, which features world-premiere solo guitar works by noted American Composers as well as the holiday recording ‘This Little Light’ with multi-Grammy-winning tenor Anthony Dean Griffey.  He is also author of the widely-acclaimed music-reading text ‘Read this First.’

Mr. Pecoraro joined the UNCSA artist-faculty in 1998 as a full-time professor of guitar-teaching graduate, college and high school guitar majors.  Previous teaching positions include Salem College, Indiana University, and the University of Colorado. He is in frequent demand as a guest clinician, and serves on the regular faculties of renowned summer music festivals in Colorado, Virginia, Wisconsin, and North Carolina, where he directs the UNCSA Summer Guitar Workshop. Following his long-standing interest in excellent music-making at the community level, Mr. Pecoraro has been involved with teaching community guitar students using the Suzuki approach for the past 20 years. He is a registered teacher trainer in guitar with the Suzuki Association of the Americas, offering courses in guitar pedagogy to teachers across the Americas. His UNCSA students have won top prizes in competitions sponsored by the National Foundation for the Advancement in the Arts, American String Teachers Association, Guitar Foundation of America and numerous regional solo and concerto competitions, and alumni have distinguished themselves as active performers, teachers and recording artists.