WILLIAM JENKS

William Jenks is a rare talent from a new generation of classical guitarists. Not only is he a world class recording artist, sought out for performances and master classes around the globe – he is also the Founder and President of a new nonprofit organization called U.S. Classic Guitar future.
Jenks established a strong presence on the festival circuit, with compelling performances at the Colorado Guitar Festival, the Portland Wine and Arts Festival, and the Festival International de Guitar in the Dominican Republic. The Boulder Colorado Classical Guitar Society, the Newport Performing Arts Center, Cycle Oregon, the local Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra, the Mottola, Italy International Guitar Festival, and the Fiuggi International Guitar Festival near Rome, Italy have all featured him.
By popular demand, he has also appeared regularly in the Portland Classic Guitar Concert Series that he created. Jenks has also focused much of his performance itinerary on the culturally rich region of Latin America.
In 2014, he was invited by the Conservatorio Nacional De Musica (in the Dominican Republic) to perform Vivaldi’s Concerto in D Major, and to judge a major classical guitar competition. John Williams, David Russell, Eliot Fisk, and the Romeros – the latter drawing a record-breaking audience of 2300 – have all performed for the Portland Classic Guitar Concert Series.

But Jenks is equally supportive of the next generation of legends, presenting the U.S. debuts of such artists as Dimirtris Kotronakis (from Greece), Gerard Abiton (from France), and Ruben Gonzales (from Cuba), as well as some of the best local up-and-coming guitar talent.
In addition to performing, and stewarding the classical guitar series, Jenks was the brains behind the Portland Classic Guitar teaching studio, which since 2001 has provided invaluable instruction for hundreds of students of all ages and skill levels, many of whom have gone on to their own music careersbuilt by renowned luthier Jeffrey Elliott and gifted by an anonymous benefactor.
In July 2015, Jenks also received an award from the Fiuggi International Guitar Festival, for his promotion of guitar music. Other recipients of this award have included the legendary composer Leo Brouwer, guitarist Eduardo Isaac, and others. Jenks was on the music faculty at Marylhurst University as guitar instructor between 2015 and 2018 before its closure, where he trained classical guitar students working toward their degrees in music and directed the Marylhurst University Guitar Ensemble.
Jenks also operated Portland Classic Guitar, a concert presenting organization, teaching studio and guitar shop through which he directed the aforementioned performance series. He presented fourteen concert seasons, with Portland Classic Guitar and was the only entity of its kind on the West Coast. Among the first featured performers was the renowned guitarist Ana Vidovic, who predicted that Jenks’s series would become “one of the most prestigious in the country” – a promise it has since fulfilled, as attested by a leading artist management company.