One of Canada\u2019s most\u00a0important and influential classical guitar players and teachers\u00a0classical guitarists, Eli Kassner (b.1924), has been awarded that country\u2019s highest civilian honor, the Order of Canada, which \u201crecognizes outstanding achievement, dedication to community, and service to the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to a release by the Guitar Society of Toronto<\/a>, \u201cEli\u2019s contributions to music in Canada have been immense. When he arrived in Canada in 1951, classical guitar had virtually no presence. Without Eli\u2019s inspiration and energy, that still might be the case today. Thanks to Eli, the Guitar Society of Toronto [which he founded in 1956] is one of North America\u2019s oldest and most active. Classical guitar studies are thriving at the University of Toronto\u2014one of the first universities in North America to treat guitar as a \u2018serious\u2019 classical instrument. Multiple generations of guitar students have been inspired to launch careers as artists, composers and teachers. \u00a0Eli\u2019s International Guitar Festivals and Competitions in the 1970s and \u201980s have laid the foundation for international guitar festivals worldwide. \u00a0There is much more,\u00a0but this gives you some idea of Eli’s extraordinary achievements.<\/p>\n \u201cAs Eli is unable to travel to Ottawa for the investiture, the award ceremony will be held for Eli personally at the Baycrest Centre [in Toronto], where he is now residing.\u201d<\/p>\n A few other details of Kassner\u2019s biography are also worth noting: At the outbreak of World War II, he fled his native Austria to work on a kibbutz in Palestine. After moving to Toronto in \u201951, he became a guitar teacher there, and by the early \u201960s\u2014after he\u2019d studied with Andr\u00e9s Segovia in Spain for a period\u2014he started teaching at the University of Toronto and at the Toronto Royal Conservatory of Music<\/a>. Later, he founded the Eli Kassner Guitar Academy<\/a> in Toronto. Besides founding the Guitar Society of Toronto and forming and directing the University of Toronto Guitar Ensemble, Kassner has also encouraged a number of Canadian composers to pen works for the guitar. In short, it\u2019s quite a remarkable legacy! His autobiography, Allegro Vivace con Brio: The Life of Eli Kassner<\/em>, was published recently.<\/p>\n Congratulations, Mr. Kassner!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" One of Canada\u2019s most\u00a0important and influential classical guitar players and teachers\u00a0classical guitarists, Eli Kassner (b.1924), has been awarded that country\u2019s highest civilian honor, the Order of Canada, which \u201crecognizes outstanding achievement, dedication to community, and service to the nation.\u201d According to a release by the Guitar Society of Toronto, \u201cEli\u2019s contributions to music in Canada have been immense. When he arrived in Canada in 1951, classical guitar had virtually no presence. Without Eli\u2019s inspiration and energy, that still might be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":4511,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-stories"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/eli.jpg?fit=1030%2C686&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4510\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/classicalguitarmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}