Biography
Dr.
Dr. Buzz Gravelle is a fretless guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, performer, recording artist, music professor, and entrepreneur whose artistic and scholarly output has spanned over three decades
Dr. Gravelle is recognized as one of the leading advocates for the fretless classical guitar, combining performance, composition, recordings, pedagogy, instrument development, and education to help establish the instrument for future generations of musicians. In 2019 he released to popular acclaim The Realm of Endless Concepts, an album of all original compositions for fretless classical guitar. Since then he has released Mirage of the White Rainbow (2024), Lucid Dream (2024), and A Year of Living Quietly (2025), which continue to further expand on the possibilities and repertoire of the fretless classical guitar. Dr. Gravelle's compositions draw upon a global musical perspective and a modernist aesthetic while remaining deeply personal, lyrical, and expressive. He is currently working on the first comprehensive method book for fretless classical guitar.
Dr. Gravelle holds both M.F.A. and D.M.A. degrees in Music from UCLA. In addition to his studies with Peter Yates and Theodore Norman, Buzz has studied composition with Manuel Enriquez, Roger Bourland, and Ian Krouse; lute with Michael Egan; and jazz guitar with Warren Nunes.
Dr. Gravelle has been on the faculty of California State Polytechnic University at Pomona for 20 years, where he teaches guitar, music theory and other classes, and coordinates the guitar studies program. He is also the co-owner and co-founder of the Santa Monica Academy of Music, now in its 30th year.
Previously Dr. Gravelle was a founding member of the Modern Arts Guitar Quartet (active 1991–1995), an ensemble of guitarists/composers that explored the leading edges of new music for guitar—prepared guitar, atonality, serialism, minimalism, electro-acoustic, and aleatoric music. Their mixture of bold experimentation and passionate performance attracted a dedicated following. The MAGQ performed over 100 concerts throughout the Western United States and Europe.
Dr. Gravelle was also a founding member and mandolinist in the performance collective ensembleFRET (active 2012–2018). Their concerts featured new music for guitar, mandolin and arpeggione (bowed guitar), in duos and trios, or in expandable combination with guest vocalists and instrumentalists. Together, the Modern Arts Guitar Quartet and EnsembleFRET premiered over 50 new concert works.
In 2021 Dr. Gravelle co-founded G&G Guitars, the official and exclusive reseller of Altamira fretless guitars. Dr. Gravelle helped design fretless versions of Altamira's standard classical guitars and plays and endorses Altamira fretless guitars.
Dr. Buzz Gravelle is a fretless guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, performer, recording artist, music professor, and entrepreneur whose artistic and scholarly output has spanned over three decades
Dr. Gravelle is recognized as one of the leading advocates for the fretless classical guitar, combining performance, composition, recordings, pedagogy, instrument development, and education to help establish the instrument for future generations of musicians. In 2019 he released to popular acclaim The Realm of Endless Concepts, an album of all original compositions for fretless classical guitar. Since then he has released Mirage of the White Rainbow (2024), Lucid Dream (2024), and A Year of Living Quietly (2025), which continue to further expand on the possibilities and repertoire of the fretless classical guitar. Dr. Gravelle's compositions draw upon a global musical perspective and a modernist aesthetic while remaining deeply personal, lyrical, and expressive. He is currently working on the first comprehensive method book for fretless classical guitar.
Dr. Gravelle holds both M.F.A. and D.M.A. degrees in Music from UCLA. In addition to his studies with Peter Yates and Theodore Norman, Buzz has studied composition with Manuel Enriquez, Roger Bourland, and Ian Krouse; lute with Michael Egan; and jazz guitar with Warren Nunes.
Dr. Gravelle has been on the faculty of California State Polytechnic University at Pomona for 20 years, where he teaches guitar, music theory and other classes, and coordinates the guitar studies program. He is also the co-owner and co-founder of the Santa Monica Academy of Music, now in its 30th year.
Previously Dr. Gravelle was a founding member of the Modern Arts Guitar Quartet (active 1991–1995), an ensemble of guitarists/composers that explored the leading edges of new music for guitar—prepared guitar, atonality, serialism, minimalism, electro-acoustic, and aleatoric music. Their mixture of bold experimentation and passionate performance attracted a dedicated following. The MAGQ performed over 100 concerts throughout the Western United States and Europe.
Dr. Gravelle was also a founding member and mandolinist in the performance collective ensembleFRET (active 2012–2018). Their concerts featured new music for guitar, mandolin and arpeggione (bowed guitar), in duos and trios, or in expandable combination with guest vocalists and instrumentalists. Together, the Modern Arts Guitar Quartet and EnsembleFRET premiered over 50 new concert works.
In 2021 Dr. Gravelle co-founded G&G Guitars, the official and exclusive reseller of Altamira fretless guitars. Dr. Gravelle helped design fretless versions of Altamira's standard classical guitars and plays and endorses Altamira fretless guitars.
