Description

Alan Mearns was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He began his musical studies with the classical violin at age five, switching to the guitar at age ten. Moving to the United States in his late teens, he studied classical guitar performance at Appalachian State University (where he held the prestigious Fletcher Scholarship) and as a graduate assistant at Austin Peay State University (where he received the Outstanding Graduate Student Award, 2003). As a classical guitarist and composer, he has performed and presented masterclasses and lectures at significant venues in the US and the UK; recent appearances include Yale University, Royal Irish Academy of Music Dublin, Oberlin Conservatory of Music, University of North Texas, New York Classical Guitar Society, Dallas Classical Guitar Society, Allegro Concert Series Fort Worth, Columbus Guitar Society, Rochester Classical Guitar Society NY, Aguado Series Washington DC, Appalachian Guitar Festival, Tosco Music Festival NC, Western Piedmont Symphony Community Concerts, among others. His recent Bach recording received wide praise and entered the Billboard Classical Music Chart at No. 8. His forthcoming release, Lorca, deals with his innovative arrangements of Spanish music. He also has extensive experience as performer-composer in a wide range of non-classical music genres, including contemporary-traditional Irish music and popular Americanaalternative-folk music (under the pseudonym Yes The Raven), along with extensive experience as studio musician, arranger, and producer. Among his 12 CD recordings, he has recorded four solo CDs as songwriter Yes The Raven, two CDs as band-leader with Airspace, a recording of Irish music with The Belfast Boys (with his long-time collaborator, the well-known Irish poet Adrian Rice), and others. His musical activities as song-writer-performer, composer, and classical guitarist have resulted in numerous magazine and radio coverage (including recent interviewperformances for NPR Classical, BBC Sounds UK, Radio Ulster, Guitar Salon International Los Angeles), video interviews and podcasts, and a recent video feature by YouTube influencer Rick Beato (which has received almost 500K views). He also enjoys significant activity as a poet; recently readings of his upcoming collection Into The Fields include the Seamus Heaney Center at Queens University Belfast, among other venues