Gianfranco Baltazar (guitarist and composer) is in his third year as music teacher at Kittredge. He was born in Lima, Peru and at age six moved to San Francisco. He studied guitar and chamber music with Scott Cmiel at both the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music pre-college and studied composition at the John Adams Young Composers Program with Director Matthew Cmiel and Chicago Symphony Composer-in-Residence Samuel Adams. The San Francisco Ballet School featured one of his compositions on their 2016 Showcase Concert and in the From the Top NPR show in San Jose.

 

Gianfranco supplemented his study of classical guitar with research and performances of traditional Peruvian music, bossa nova, tango and flamenco. He has studied four years with David Tanenbaum at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, as well as taking master classes with Sergio Assad, Manuel Barrueco, William Kanengiser, David Leisner and Su Meng.