PGS Mission Statement
The Peninsula Guitar Series is dedicated to bringing the classical guitar to the Peninsula’s diverse community, bridging the gap between the concert hall and new audiences. Since 2012, we have presented local, emerging, and international guitarists to perform in concert and to provide educational activities furthering the appreciation of the guitar in the Bay Area. As ambassadors of the guitar, we seek to enrich and strengthen the lives of those we touch through our vibrant classical guitar community of concertgoers, exemplary artists, and dedicated educators.
Board of Directors
The Peninsula Guitar Series is comprised of Board of Directors who are also community leaders that volunteer their time to help advance the classical guitar in the San Francisco Bay Area.
PGS Executive Board
Thomas Keegan – President – Thomas P. Keegan is the President and a member of the Board of Directors of Peninsula Guitar Series. Now semi-retired, he has held various positions in business and private law practice over the years. Tom has served, variously, as President, and as General Counsel of Oplink Communications, Inc. a (then) publicly traded telecom systems equipment company. For approximately twenty years he practiced law as an attorney in Silicon Valley including six years as a partner with the law firm Jack and Keegan, LLP. His practice areas included commercial litigation, international business disputes, business and technology transactions, and intellectual property enforcement, with a focus on trans-national disputes involving parties and businesses in or from Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. He also served for several years as a member of the board of directors of the Chinese Language Immersion Program Community Organization, a non-profit corporation that provided funding for the Mandarin language programs of the Cupertino Union School District. Tom enjoys classical guitar music.
Rahul Gandhi – Treasurer – Rahul Gandhi is the Director of Analytics at Ascend Capital. He received his B.S degree from Harvard University and M.S. and Ph.D degrees from Stanford University. His lifelong love of music began when he started taking guitar lessons at the age of seven, and he is extremely fortunate to be able to share his love with his two children, a guitarist and a flutist.
Vrinda Mushran – Secretary – Vrinda Mushran has an undergraduate degree in Psychology, an MBA and also certification in software development. With an eighteen year career in software development as an engineer and engineering leader, Vrinda has switched into Early Childhood Education and Development by launching an experience-rich preschool program in Redwood Shores. With 2 boys who have been students at Longay Conservatory of Guitar and California Conservatory of Music for 9+ years, Vrinda wants to help increase the reach, joy, and discipline of classical music education to more children especially young learners ages 3-9 years.”
Robert Barker – Board Member – Robert Barker is a business development and partnership management consultant for the last 35 years in Silicon Valley. He achieved a life-long dream to learn about music and the guitar, originally through Longay Conservatory of Guitar where he met Robert Miller and Christopher Mallet. When Robert and Chris formed California Conservatory of Music, he joined as an adult guitar student. Now he brings his business and technology industry experience to the Peninsula Guitar Series Board.
PGS Artistic Directors
Christopher Mallett – Christopher Mallett is a classical guitarist in the San Francisco Bay Area and is currently a lecturer of Classical Guitar Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In addition to his solo and chamber performance career, he is also the Co-Founder and Co-Director of the Peninsula Guitar Series as well as the California Conservatory of Music. Mallett has extensive outreach experience bringing classical guitar music to low-income communities throughout the U.S. During his studies at Yale University in 2009, his guitar duo, Duo Noire, was awarded the Alumni Ventures Grant which allowed them to work with over 2000 children in 15 schools throughout New York and New England. Starting in 2011, Duo Noire has been a recurring artist resident for the St. Louis Classical Guitar Society where they performed in more than two-dozen outreach concerts in the St. Louis public school system. Mallett has also worked with students internationally as part of DuoSF with Robert Miller, performing and teaching extensively throughout Southeast Asia in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand.
Robert Miller – Guitarist Robert O’Connor Miller is a passionate performer, chamber musician, guitar teacher, and educator whose performances have been described as “intense, emotional and graceful” by the Rochester City Newspaper. Robert has performed throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. Recent concerts have taken him to concert halls and guitar festivals in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia and to concerts series and universities throughout California. Often at these engagements aside from performing, he is also giving masterclasses and judging competitions. He received his Bachelor of Music Performance from Ithaca College in 2006, where he studied with classical guitarist Pablo Cohen and jazz guitarist Steve Brown. On the receipt of a graduate scholarship award, he attended the prestigious Eastman School of Music, where he studied with Nicholas Goluses and was awarded a Master of Music Performance. After graduating in 2008, Robert was a fellow with the Belgian American Educational Foundation from which he received a fully-funded stipend to study and concertize in Belgium. There, he furthered his studies at the Lemmensinstituut with a poet of the guitar, Raphaella Smits. The Lemmensinstiuut awarded him master’s degrees in both guitar performance and chamber music. With a deep belief in the power of the arts and the need for artists to rise up as entrepreneurs and advocates for their craft, Robert co-founded The California Conservatory of Guitar in 2011. The school currently enriches and empowers the lives of over 150 students and families in the San Francisco Bay Area. Recent graduates have went on to pursue and continue their study of music at renowned institutions such as Harvard, Brown, and the University of Southern California. In 2014, The Guitar Foundation of America selected an ensemble from the school to perform at their annual convention in L.A. In 2012, Robert also co-founded The Peninsula Guitar Series, a concert series that brings international talent to the Bay Area to present concerts and masterclasses. Since 2010, Robert has been very active throughout the United States and Asia with his classical guitar duo, DuoSF. In a review of their debut CD titled “Corta Jaca,” Classical Guitar Magazine recently wrote, “effortlessly played”, and “this interpretation is one of the very best I have heard…an outstanding recording of some lovely music in superb performances beautifully captured. One to hunt for!”