BIOGRAPHY

John Chapman grew up in the town of Hartsdale New York where he began studying acoustic guitar at age eleven and a half in 1980. After about three months of guitar lessons, with a very enthusiastic and supportive guitar teacher and family friend, Chapman was able to perform basic improvisations and transcribe melodies from cartoons and TV shows by ear. Within a year Chapman created a garage band with friends who played bass and drums and named the group “Ground Level Zero”. Chapman was greatly influenced by the music his parents played around the house from artists that included; the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Joni Mitchell, Grover Washington Jr., Steely Dan, Bob Dylan, Classical Music and other great musicians. A year and half later at 13 years of age his once favorite pastimes; skateboarding, bike riding and basketball began to take a back seat to listening to music, learning about musical equipment, practicing and rehearsing for many hours each day.

At 16 years of age his practice became more focused due to Chapman's intense study with an accomplished local guitarist, alumni of Berkeley College of Music. He learned how to use a metronome to learn scales and chords with rhythms while incorporating music theory to approach improvisation that opened up many new doors in the performance and improvisation within the blues rock music idiom he was immersed in at the time, fueling his passion and dedication for more complex harmonies and rhythms in to come in Jazz and Latin music. At this time Chapman realized that studying, performing and composing music on guitar was clearly a calling, not a choice. In mid high school, Chapman performed at dances and battle of the band competitions in a rock, pop and blues cover band named “JC and the Network” with fellow classmates whose initials where all "JC". This was Chapman's first band performing in front of audience that wasn't family or neighborhood friends. It was a fun, great and fruitful experience and Chapman's guitar technique and overall musicianship grew immensely from the experience of learning many great pop cover songs, but at a certain point Chapman felt his strong improvisational skills weren’t being used to their full potentials.

Immediately after high school, from about 18 years old through age 23, Chapman decided to forgo college to perform with many Rock, Blues and Jazz-Fusion acts that composed and performed original music and cover material throughout the greater New York City and Savannah Georgia areas in nightclubs, at private events and concerts. Some locations included: Manny's Car Wash, Chicago Blues, The Bitter End, The Chance, Hard Hearted Hannah's, Savannah Blues, The Bayou and many others.

In 1992 at 23 years of age, now with some real world personal and professional life experience under his belt John Chapman auditioned to be enrolled at the Purchase College Music Conservatory in Purchase in New York and was admitted. The Studio Composition degree program provided him access to key elements of recording engineering, music composition mainly in the styles of pop and jazz and merged intense pop and jazz guitar study which also included comprehensive training in classical music theory and music history. This was five year period of paramount musical growth for Chapman. Aside from his studies with top notch music professionals he also benefited from producing and recording singer songwriters, and became more proficient and confident at composing his own original instrumental and vocal music. In 1997 John Chapman was awarded a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from Purchase College, Purchase New York.

After college Chapman undertook intensive vocal and songwriting training with the super talented and supportive nationally acclaimed Singer Songwriter Sloan Wainwright. John Chapman’s guitar playing has aired on national and international TV and radio and he has performed with top level studio and touring musicians that perform with: Blood Sweat and Tears, Branford Marsalis, Buddy Guy, David Bowie, Dave Mann, Harry Belafonte, Joey Calderazzo, Natalie Cole, John Lucien, John Scofield, Leslie West, Mike Stern, George Porter, Sheryl Crow, Spyro Gyra, Sting, Tina Turner, Tower of Power and many others.

Over the last 15 years John Chapman has provided professional instruction on guitar and bass. He has developed a targeted, layered and accelerated guitar method book and DVD series that's like no other guitar method; focusing on technique, rhythm, time and fret board navigation in ways that connect body and mind, currently nearing completion.

In 2005 Chapman began to extend more of his guitar playing focus and study on finger-style chord melody performance. In 2007 Chapman began performing finger-style solo nylon string classical guitar for weddings and special event celebrations in the greater San Francisco Bay area after relocating from NYC. John Chapman’s solo classical performances are unique in that most other classical finger style players are limited to the study and performance of usually only one style in; Classical, Flamenco, Brazilian or Spanish solo nylon string guitar.

Chapman's extensive pop guitar back round on steel string acoustic and electric guitars provides him a rich rhythmic, melodic, harmonic and technical palette that allows him to authentically cover many styles and meld more traditional styles of finger-style nylon string guitar like; Classical, Brazilian, Spanish and Latin guitar into new exciting solo nylon string guitar hybrids when he performs on his beautiful hand crafted nylon string classical guitar. It creates an exciting mood when you hear Bossa Nova and Jazz infused with with Blues and Funk on a nylon string classical guitar. Chapman's performance styles include: Jazz Ballads and Standards, Bossa Nova, Spanish Style Classical, Nuevo Flamenco, Folk, Rock, Pop, R&B, Latin Jazz, Smooth Jazz and even Bluegrass or Country.

Chapman's core guitar influences come from: Stevie Ray Vaughn, George Harrison, Keith Richards, Steve Windward, Jimmy Page, Randy Rhoads, Walter Becker, Eddie Van Halen, Django Reinhardt, Kenny Burrell, BB King, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Mark Knofler, Paul Jackson Jr., Wes Montgomery, Larry Carlton, Hiram Bullock, Robben Ford, Romero Lubambo, Baden Powell, Paco De Lucia and others. Other musical influences come from a more recent study in Latin and Classical music with musicians like Mozart, Bach, Wagner, Debussy, Stravinsky and many well known Jazz horn, piano and organ players.

Now 2009, with nearly 30 years of guitar playing experience, John Chapman has become an acoustic classical performer of merit in the greater San Francisco Bay Area that garners rave reviews from clients and vendors alike. Chapman enjoys exploring the vast expressive possibilities inherent in the simple beautiful sound of the nylon string classical guitar along with the lack of restriction and great improvisational possibilities inherent when performing on solo classical guitar.

John Chapman finds it exciting to learn new material suggested by clients and colleagues to be performed at wedding ceremonies, receptions and special event celebrations or just for his private enjoyment. He appreciates continually becoming a more versatile guitarist through; continually expanding his repertoire, submitting to  challenges inherent when acquiring new skills and tackling new techniques that truly embody the beauty and dedication of solo finger-style classical guitar music. Chapman is grateful for how this musical diversity continually expands and grows his overall musicianship, enhances his skill as a song writer and grounds his love and connection for music on deeper levels, in part by his understanding of how promising each new and exciting classical guitar performance situation can be.