Dan Kyzer Classical Guitarist
BIOGRAPHY
Called “A sensitive and poetic soul” by Maestro Eliot Fisk, Dr. Dan Kyzer is an award-winning classical guitarist based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Along with top prizes won at the New Orleans International Guitar Festival, Southern Guitar Festival, and Mississippi Guitar Festival, Dan has also garnered prizes at the Sierra Nevada Guitar Festival, Texas International Guitar Competition, and Lone Star Guitar Festival. He has been named a Finalist at the Sharon Lynn Wilson Center Competition and a Semi-Finalist at the Columbus State University Guitar Symposium. Dan has performed solo recitals at venues and universities across the U.S., including an appearance at the Renzo Piano Pavilion Auditorium, as well as Oklahoma City University, Louisiana Tech University, The Boston Public Library, Woods Hole Library, Tulane University, and the Dallas Museum of Art. Dan has also developed a love for choral and orchestral music with the guitar, having performed with the Fort Worth Opera, Millennial Choir and Orchestra, Boston Metro Opera, Orpheus Chamber Singers, UNT University Singers, MIT Women’s Chorus, and Tyler Civic Chorale.
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For the last ten years, Dan has played for hundreds of weddings, corporate events, parties, gallery openings, exhibit openings, and many other public and private events. Venues like the Dallas Museum of Art, Sundance Square, the Kimball Art Museum, the Meadows Museum at SMU, the Fort Worth Modern, Allen Performing Arts Center, Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Gardens, Fort Worth Botanical Garden, Fort Worth Water Gardens, and many of the area's premier hotels and wedding venues.
Dan’s interests in teaching, research, and activism include topics like the intersections of film, philosophy, and music, music education for guitarists at the collegiate level, and advocacy and support for new and established pre-college guitar programs in k-12 schools. Previously, Dan worked at Mountain View College in Dallas, where he established the Mountain View College Guitar Festival in 2015. For five years, the MVC Guitar Fest brought together high school and middle school guitar ensembles from across DFW and solo competitors from as far as Minnesota to compete, attend concerts, and participate in masterclasses. Dan teaches at the University of Texas at Tyler, where he runs the guitar studio, directs the UT Tyler Guitar Ensemble, and advises the Classical Guitar Guild at UT Tyler. He also teaches applied lessons at Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Art.
Dr. Kyzer completed his D.M.A. at the University of North Texas, an M.M. degree at The New England Conservatory, and a B.M. at the University of Southern Mississippi. He plays a 2019 Aaron Ringo double top guitar made in Weatherford, TX.