Blog

Jonathan Barlow & Roger Harmon

May 8th, 2012 in Endorsed Artists

Award winning Guitarists Roger Harmon and Jonathan Barlow are versatile musicians with careers that involve performing various kinds of music, composing and arranging music for publication, and promoting their work as recording artists. They also periodically receive grant funding and cash-prize awards. They both earned Master of Music degrees in classical guitar from the University of Denver (DU) where they met and began performing together. Since graduation, their alma mater has taken notice of their accomplishments and not only written an article about them for the alumni magazine but also invited them to be guest lecturers in a career workshop entitled “Entrepreneurship in Music.” Although classically trained, they pride themselves on their abilities in many genres including jazz and popular styles. As signed recording artists with Azica Records they share a roster with guitar luminaries Jason Vieaux, David Leisner, and Grammy-winning jazz pianist Bill Cunliffe. Roger and Jonathan’s music is distributed internationally by Naxos of America, has received traditional radio play, and can be heard on Pandora, Last.FM, Rdio, and Spotify. They recorded their first album under the name Massif Trio, a group formed by Jonathan to perform his arrangements of 19th century German art songs for 2 guitars and voice. Their album Massif Trio Plays Schumann, Schubert and Strauss garnered reviews from American Record Guide and All Music Guide; it was praised as “a masterful performance filled with keen musical insight, evocative text painting, and enticing sound quality.” The arrangements found on the album are published with Clear Note Publications. Jonathan is also published with Lathkill Music Publishers and Soundboard guitar journal published one of his arrangements and wrote an article about him. His work has been called “fabulous” by Guitarnotes, ”superb” by Steve Marsh of Classical Guitar Magazine, and “tasteful, impeccably written and exceptionally enjoyable” by Rovi Music. A growing number of university music libraries carry his publications. Roger and Jonathan are proud to be endorsed artists with Steve Clayton Guitar Picks, Godin Guitars, Curt Mangan Strings, and Sfarzo String Company. They are represented by Denver booking agency Masterful Musicians and have won many awards including: The Orville Moore Memorial Award – from the Allied Arts, Inc.- given for “achievement in German art song,” and the ASCAPlus Award – from the American Society of Composers Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) – a national award given for “creative contributions to American music.”