About the Musician

Dr. Andrew Flory is a classical guitarist, theorbo player, lutenist, and educator based in Rochester, New York. In 2024, Andrew received his Doctor of Musical Arts in Classical Guitar Performance, Certificate of Advanced Achievement in Early Music, and Performer’s Certificate in Classical Guitar from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. As a multiinstrumentalist and Early music specialist, Andrew captivates audiences around the world with his colorful and nuanced musicality in his repertoire that spans over 500 years across many instruments. Along with his solo career, Andrew is a veteran continuo player with the Collegium Musicum Baroque orchestra and was a member of the Schola Cantorum at Christ Church in Rochester. Notable recent performances include a concert and Baroque Performance Practice and guitar lectures for the University of Arkansas, a concert and masterclass for the Connecticut Guitar Guild, concerts for the Great Lakes Guitar Society, Rochester Guitar Festival 2022, Rochester Fringe Festival 2021 and 2022, RCS Big Guitar Weekend Student and Alumni showcase 2022, Christ Church Candlelight Concert 2023, MUSIC at St. Mark’s 2022 and 2023, and many performances with Collegium Musicum and Schola Cantorum featuring music by Monteverdi, Purcell, Palestrina, and more. For his “musical excellence” and “outstanding academic record”, Andrew was inducted into the Pi Kappa Lambda Music Honor Society in 2023. At Eastman, Andrew studied guitar with Naxos recording artist Nicholas Goluses and he studied lute and theorbo with world renowned lutenist and pedagogue Paul O’Dette. Andrew received his Master of Music degree from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in 2020 under the direction of Allan Neave and Matthew McAllister. It was at RCS where Andrew began his lute and theorbo studies with Jamie Akers. He received his Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Arkansas in 2015 where he studied with Dr. James Greeson. Andrew’s theorbo is a reproduction of a 17th century Schelle theorbo which was built by Daniel Yost of Buffalo, New York. Andrew plays a 2016 Stephan Connor guitar.

About the Program

This program features solo works for theorbo and classical guitar. The title “Fourteen & Six” is in reference to the fourteen strings of the theorbo and the six strings of the classical guitar. The theorbo is the largest of the lute family of instruments and was developed in the very late 16th century in Florence, Italy. A behemoth in size and sound, the theorbo quickly gained popularity as an accompaniment instrument where it excelled in playing continuo in the earliest of operas and for chamber groups and solo voice. Throughout the entirety of the baroque era, the theorbo flourished in its accompanying role but a mere sliver of solo works for the instrument survive when compared to what can be played on the instrument for accompanying purposes. However, there are three composers that stand out in their quality of solo music for the instrument and in the amount of their solo theorbo works that survive. Those three composers are Alessandro Piccinini (1566-1638), Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger (1580-1651), and Robert de Visée (1655-1732/1733) and they are featured in today’s program. The guitar works in this program feature the Viennese Romantic composer Johann Kaspar Mertz and two contemporary composers, Olga Amelkina-Vera and Phillip Houghton. Variations mignonnes by Mertz is from his Bardenklänge, Op. 13 which was a collection of pieces based on folk and popular songs of 19th century Vienna. This collection is also his largest collection of works. Western Vista by Olga Amelkina-Vera is a beautiful portrayal of the American West and the larger than life image of the 19th century cowboy. In it’s bittersweet opening movement, we hear the tune of the famous cowboy song “Bury Me Not On The Lone Prairie”. This is followed by a rousing second movement based on the idea of a cowboy riding a bucking bronco. The final work in this program is OPHELIA...a haunted sonata by the late Australian composer Phillip Houghton. This piece is centered around the tragic Shakespearean character Ophelia from the play Hamlet. Her descent into madness and her untimely death is outlined in the titles of the movements of the piece. Musically, Houghton employs an altered tuning of the guitar to create a dark sonority that complements the somber nature of the piece. I find this piece to be one of my favorites to perform as it is incredibly captivating and unrelentingly pulls at one’s heartstrings.