Terry Mills
Instruments:
Classical/Acoustic Guitar and Lute
Terry Mills has been performing as a
classical guitarist and renaissance lute soloist in the Central
Valley and Bay Area for the past 35 years. Recently
retired from directing guitar studies at the University of Pacific’s
Conservatory of Music and San
Joaquin Delta College in Stockton, CA, he has taken up
residence in Sonoma County where he maintains private
instruction studios in Sebastopol and at Stanroy Music in Santa
Rosa, as well as being a guitar instructor on the teaching staff at
Santa Rosa Junior College.
As a teacher, his intention is to provide a
relaxed, fun environment for his students, where the joy of
music making is the primary objective. His goal is to
impart, based on each person’s individual needs, the
information and skills necessary to create in each student a
sense of creative self-sufficiency.
His teaching focuses on classical and
finger-style acoustic guitar styles for students of all
levels and abilities. An accomplished lutenist, he
also instructs students on that instrument taking them back in
time to the renaissance and baroque period of European history.
His education includes a Bachelor’s degree
in Music Education from the University of Pacific,
graduate studies in classical guitar at Sacramento State,
participation in master classes at the Aspen Music Festival
and lute studies domestically and in England.
He’s past director of the early music ensemble,
The Woodes So Wylde Consort, the Delta Guitar Ensemble
and the Pacific Guitar Ensemble, and a former member of
the flute-guitar duo, Windsong.
Currently, in addition to being a member of the Bachianas
Duo, with cellist Jeffery Johnson, he’s a performing
member of the nuevo-folk trio, The
Farallons. His other musical interests include bossa
nova and flamenco guitar.
