BIO

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Mircea Gogoncea is a 29-year-old Romanian-German classical guitarist based in Los Angeles.

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He has performed in over 350 concerts on 5 continents. Having been awarded a total of 168 prizes, he is also considered one of the guitarists with the highest number of awards in the world.

As a frequent collaborator of talented living composers, Mircea enjoys bringing into focus the influence of traditional music on the classical contemporary genre, with a particular affinity for music from West Africa and the Balkan region. He is also interested in challenging the boundaries between music and technology and the traditional separation between the roles of composer, performer, and listener.

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In April 2018, he organized and taught the first-ever guitar masterclass and workshop in Lagos, Nigeria. Fundraising for this charity project consisted in a 7-concert tour of India and one performance in Germany. His trip to India and Nigeria was turned into a documentary that can be watched on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ks8ItxzoPcY .

He is currently a Teaching Assistant for ethnomusicology at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and a guitar performance doctoral student under Grammy award winner Scott Tennant. In April 2021, he was awarded the General Education Graduate Assistant Award for his “excellent” contribution to the USC General Education Program.

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He graduated with maximum marks and honors from the Advanced Diploma doctoral-level program of the Royal Academy of Music in London and from the Konzertexamen post-master’s excellence program at the Robert Schumann Hochschule Düsseldorf.

Previously, he had completed two master’s degrees simultaneously in Düsseldorf and London. During his studies in London, he was awarded the inaugural David Russell Prize in 2014.