Weekly Meeting - Changing Lives Through Music

Changing Lives Through Music in Austin & Around the World

Summary 

In addition to performing beautiful classical guitar music, Dr. Matthew Hinsley will describe how Austin Classical Guitar reaches about 4,000 diverse young people in Austin each day in 60 rigorous school programs including the Travis County Juvenile Justice System and Texas School for the Blind.  He’ll speak about ACG’s Lullaby Project in collaboration with Carnegie Hall, about the international reach of ACG’s education curriculum and training program, as well as the artists from around the globe that perform on ACG’s seven concert series.

 

Named Public Citizen of the Year in 2017 by the Texas Statewide Division of the National Association of Social Workers, and Winner of a 2015 Austin Under 40 award, Dr. Matthew Hinsley has worked as a community arts organizer in Central Texas since his arrival in 1996.  As Executive Director of Austin Classical Guitar (ACG), Dr. Hinsley has raised millions of dollars in support of broad concert, outreach and educational programming, building the nation’s largest classical guitar nonprofit organization.  In 2015 he joined the faculty at the University of Texas College of Fine Arts to teach courses in arts entrepreneurship and business management in the arts.

Dr. Hinsley is founder and a lead author of the ACG curriculum and music library that, paired with extensive direct service, has transformed classroom guitar education in Austin and changed the lives of thousands of diverse young people.  The curriculum, which is now used internationally, is in service in 50 area schools including programs at the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Gardner Betts of the Travis County Juvenile Justice System, and the Foster Care System.

Dr. Hinsley
 was trained as a classical guitarist and vocalist at the Interlochen Arts Academy, the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, and the University of Texas at Austin.  He has written three books Classical Guitar for Young People, Creativity to Community: Arts Nonprofit Success One Coffee at a Time, and, most recently, Tinder & Flint, the first in a series of fantasy novels.