It’s a joy today to share the second in our series of reflections on the impact of Austin Classical Guitar over the course of its 35 years.
We’d love to hear from you, too! If you have a story to share, just email [email protected]
Learn more about supporting ACG here.
Dr. Tony Mariano is our beloved Director of Community Education here at ACG, but as you’ll discover his connection to us started far away a long time ago. Here’s his story:
I first heard of ACG as an 18-year-old growing up in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was 2011 and New Mexico was hosting its second-ever guitar all-state event. Matt Hinsley was our guest clinician.
I remember sitting with my guitar, watching Matt conduct, loving how he led with feeling and intention, asking us to connect with the deeper expressive elements – all the really good stuff!
These rehearsals are all-day things. For lunch everyone goes off on their own, but I remember Matt–in the midst of making lunch plans with the event hosts–look over at me as I was hanging around, and asking, “Hey Tony, do you want to come to lunch with us?”
While that might seem like a small gesture, I cannot tell you how much it meant to me. He included me. He made me feel important, like I mattered, like I was a part of this with him.
At that point, I had been fortunate enough to experience the beauty of community in art making. But I had also experienced exclusion and elitism–music making for the purpose of prestige. That can be a hard space; it doesn’t always feel very good. But that’s not Matt, and that’s not ACG.
While I sat at lunch–a high school senior eating with the all-state guest clinician from Texas and event hosts–I heard about a vision of music as a force for good in the world. I heard music spoken about as a service. And I loved that. I felt like I was included in something great, even if it was just for that moment. That inclusion, that implicit “come with us and do beautiful things,” I would later learn is at the core of everything that is ACG.
Fast forward a decade, and I was lucky enough to be working on this amazing team. I’ve since realized that the very fabric of ACG is woven to create a space for including others, to help us all realize that we are capable of experiencing and making beauty. I see it in our work with schools, finding ways to make students of all levels feel included in a process of authentic music making. I see it in our work with the community, involving lovers of music in an experience that reaches amazing levels of artistry and expression. I see it in our work within the juvenile justice system, where kids are reminded that they are more than just their mistakes, and that they’re just as much a part of this creative community as everyone else.
So thank you, ACG, for 35 years of making me, and everyone in our community, feel included in something special and unique. And thank you to everyone who has supported what we’ve done over these last three and a half decades, because you make this space possible.
Tony Mariano