January - In our January TGS meeting Jeffrey Hiatt-Frink demonstrated his steel string tapping technique on his rendition of Phil Keaggy's "County Down". Johnny Beard blew us all away with his phenomenal flamenco technique on an original piece. And Philip Ansteth led the group in a jam session on Django Reinhardt's "Minor Blues".

February - Our first Fingerstyle Showcase concert took place Tuesday, Feb. 21 at ORU's Timko Barton Hall and was a big success. (Click here to view a Quicktime video of the concert. The video is 14 MB and could take an hour to download on a dialup connection. Requires the Quicktime player which can be downloaded from Apple's website.) Ranging from classical to flamenco to country to blues to jazz to new age, the evening gave the audience a taste of what Tulsa's fingerstyle guitar scene has to offer.

Our February meeting took place during a snowstorm but a few brave souls ventured out despite the weather, including three first-timers. ORU guitar coordinator Chris Brown conducted a clinic on guitar chords and arrangement provoking a lively discussion. Robert Coldwell played an excerpt from his recent publication of compositions by Bobrowicz, a student of Mauro Giuliani. And Joesf Glaude performed some slide guitar for us on his retro resonator blues guitar.

March - We had a special treat for our March meeting. Tony Nuspl and his dance partner Alicia Hutchins from "Argentine Tango of Tulsa" danced for the group as we all played Tomo Y Obligo to the singing of Rosa Cardozo from Venezuela. We met Tony at Shades of Brown in January where several members of the society had gathered on a Sunday night. As he listened to us playing he asked us if we could play a tango. We did our best and he and his dance partner displayed their moves for the small crowd that had gathered. Afterward we invited them to dance for us at one of our meetings. We look forward to more projects with local dancers and singers as TGS becomes more active in the local arts scene.

April - In our April meeting Johnny Walker, a classical and flamenco guitar luthier from Bartlesville, did a presentation on building guitars and brought a couple of models for us to play. They were true works of art. Also in April James Ruggles and Amy Sebran (the Tempest Duo) played a couple of guitar and violin duets.

The TGS was featured in the Tulsa Front Page March 22 issue. (Click here to view the article.) Thanks to Julie Gustafson for the story. She scooped the other local media outlets on this one! She found out about us on a local events calendar announcing the Fingerstyle Spotlight concert, and was surprised to find out that Tulsa has a guitar society. Well thanks to her others will also find out now.

May - We welcomed several first time performers for the society, including 14 year old Brandon Vaverka from Enid who plays classical guitar and 18 year old Blake Peters, a jazz student under Randy Wimer. Manuel Prestamo from OK Mozart visited with us and invited those at the meeting to attend one of the many performances of their music festival in Bartlesville in June. Also at the meeting we announced our new TGS membership plan.

The TGS was represented at the Tulsa Guitar and String show May 6, 7 at the Crowne Plaza in downtown Tulsa. Over 100 people stopped by our booth and chatted with our representatives, wanting to learn more about us. We're looking forward to seeing some of them at our next couple of meetings and future TGS events. Thanks to Scott Hambrick and Midwest Shows, Inc. for putting on a great expo. We can't wait to work with them again.

Friday May 12 was Flamenco Night at the Saffron Coffee House. Performers included Rod Saunders, Lon Bartlett, Ron Radford, Johnny Beard with daughters Lexi & Lissie, Philip Ansteth accompanying singer Rosa Cardozo, J.T. Gentry, Joesf Glaude, and Martin Perez. We had a great time celebrating this incredible art form and establishing & renewing relationships. Special thanks to Ron Radford who took time to include a mini-concert for us before heading back to St. Louis. Ron's programs for 6 Tulsa schools, the Tulsa Boys Home and the mini-concert at Saffron were sponsored by The Arts Foundation in Tulsa with funding from the Oklahoma Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. The Saffron Flamenco Night was an opportunity not only to showcase local flamenco talent but also to honor Ron as their teacher and as a pioneer of the art of flamenco in Tulsa. We'll see Ron again next March when we'll be hosting a master class during his trip to Tulsa for a performance at the PAC."

June - Our June meeting was the last one held in the Brookside Library. Joesf Glaude gave a presentation on modes, Ray Wallace shared some of his restaurant act with us, and the Pendelton Family Fiddlers played The Beaumont Rag and Sweet Georgia Brown.

July - The July meeting was our first to be held in our new location at Agora. We watched a DVD of fingerstyle jazz virtuoso Martin Taylor prior to the recital. Whitney Ludwig played and sang an original song and Darren Armentrout displayed his unique acoustic style. Following the recital Jeffrey Hiatt-Frink played a couple of tunes and violinist James Ruggles improvised on one classical and one flamenco piece with two of our guitarists.

August - We were treated to a mini guitar seminar conducted by Tulsa's Randy Wimer. Randy demonstrated his technique and tips on making your practice time productive. Also in August we conducted our first artist concert when Edgar Cruz performed in the Agora auditorium.

September - We celebrated our first anniversary with a pot luck dinner and a couple of hours of open mic entertainment. Also in September we conducted our second Fingerstyle Showcase concert at ORU's Timko-Barton Performance Hall. (Click here to view a video montage of the concert. The video is 16 MB and could take an hour to download on a dialup connection. Requires the Quicktime player which can be downloaded from Apple's website.) We will be presenting two of these concerts each year as part of ORU's student concert series. The third highlight from September was the Tommy Emmanuel concert at the Tulsa Performing Arts Center. While he was here Tommy put on a workshop for local guitarists. The TGS sponsored 15 year old Elliot Butay's attendance and was introduced as a co-sponsor at Tommy's concerts.

October - In our monthly meeting we watched video highlights from the September Fingerstyle Spotlight concert at ORU. Also John Hnath and Ken Ames showed some of the photos they took that night. Joesf Glaude did a blues presentation on his resonator guitar.

November - We had our biggest turnout of the year at our monthly meeting as Steve Roberts did a presentation on chords and Pete Astor appeared for the first time and displayed his tapping technique on a couple of original tunes.

December - We had a great time at our last monthly meeting of the year playing and singing Christmas carols featuring fingerstyle guitar solos and accompaniment.  Rod Saunders and Joesf Glaude also did a few tunes on the banjo and Jeffrey and Lynette Hiatt-Frink led the group in a singalong (and playalong) of Silent Night.