Minnesota Guitar Society

The Minnesota Guitar Society (MGS) mission is to promote the guitar in all its stylistic and cultural diversity through sponsorship of public forums, concerts, and workshops; and serve as an educational link between the community and amateur and professional guitarists of all ages. Our organization is a 501(c)3 non-profit with elected board members and officers. Our one salaried staff person is a half-time Managing Director responsible for planning and implementing programs, promoting concerts and events, coordinating volunteers, fundraising, maintaining our website, and producing our newsletter. Our board meets quarterly. Individual board members carry out a variety of monthly tasks in support of our programs. Since its founding in 1985, the MGS has presented emerging artists as well as regionally and internationally known performers at venues from assisted living centers to concert halls. Our current main performance program is an annual concert series at Sundin Music Hall. A cornerstone project of our organization since 1996, this series connects our audience with the experience of live musical performances and supports our outreach and education efforts. In 2019, we launched our first ongoing guitar education program, Guitar In Our Schools (GIOS), with grants from the Augustine and D’Addario foundations and the support of our members. In GIOS, we partner with general music teachers, band and choir directors, and guitar teachers at area K-12 public schools. We arrange informal performances and masterclasses by professional guitarists based here in Minnesota and touring artists from our Sundin Music Hall series. We support or help create guitar classes during the school day with curriculum materials, teaching assistants (on a short- or long-term basis), and guitars when needed. We provide performance opportunities for student soloists and ensembles. In 2020, with a grant from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, we launched a second education program, Guitar Opportunities for All Learners (GOAL), to provide meaningful, ongoing guitar instruction to students with special needs or challenges that cannot be met in a standard classroom. Our first GOAL partnership was with the Special Education Department of White Bear Lake High School. A teaching artist from our GIOS team implemented two classes designed for those students and worked with them twice a week for the 2020-21 school year. The project ended with an online concert by the students that was shared with their families and friends. More information about our organization and its programs can be found at our website: