Berklee College of Music was the first institution of higher education to grant a degree with guitar as the principal instrument. To this day, Berklee's Guitar Department remains the largest and most stylistically diverse guitar program in the world.
Many of the world's most ground-breaking guitarists studied at Berklee, including Mike Stern, Leni Stern, Kevin Eubanks, Bill Frisell, Gillian Welch, Emily Remler, John Scofield, Steve Vai, St. Vincent, and Adrianne Lenker and Buck Meek of Big Thief. Our alumni community includes current and former faculty such as: Mick Goodrick, Pat Metheny, Sheryl Bailey, Wayne Krantz, Tomo Fujita, David Tronzo, and Tim Miller. Meet some of our alumni.
They joined our Berklee community because of who we are: the world's largest independent music school and the premier institution for the study of contemporary music.
The Guitar Department at Berklee offers the most comprehensive guitar education in the world. We provide private instruction, labs, and ensembles in all styles, including jazz, blues, rock, metal, funk, fingerstyle, classical, world music, microtonal music, and the avant-garde.
Students may specialize in the style of their choice, branching out as much as they’d like to other genres. Our faculty are experts in each discipline and bring decades of professional experience and dedication to teaching their curricula. Together with this instruction, our clinics, master classes, sessions, and performance venues offer students a myriad of playing opportunities.
We understand the ways in which guitarists work in today’s complex professional musical communities. Our instrument is versatile and offers us the opportunity to work in a variety of situations while developing a personal sound. We believe that our diverse guitar community lays the foundation for students to move forward in their careers and lifelong study.
