The Cohort for Guitar Research is a subsidiary of the Consortium. Its principal purpose is to encourage younger and early-career scholars, though it is not restricted to them. In any one year, all those who applied for the Andrew Britton Fellowship and reached the judging stage (including the successful applicant) are eligible for invitation to the Cohort meeting the following year, together with those from previous years whose work is still of relevance to the Consortium’s field of interest. Under normal circumstances, the Cohort meets in alternate years when there is no Consortium meeting.

Current members of the Cohort are:

Miles Henderson Smith

Miles Henderson Smith is a guitar maker based in Falmouth, Cornwall. He specialises in making modern classical guitars in the tradition of Torres and Hauser. His research focuses on the embodied knowledge of lutherie in an ongoing attempt to refine the craft. mileshendersonsmith.com

Reggie Lawrence

Luiz Mantovani

A winner of the Pro Musicis International Award (New York, 2001), Luiz Mantovani’s vast ensemble experience includes long-term collaborations with Latin Grammy-winner Brazilian Guitar Quartet and the NOVA Guitar Duo. Luiz was the first guitarist to receive an Artist Diploma from the New England Conservatory in Boston, also holding a Master’s degree with honours from NEC and a Bachelor’s degree from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He is currently a CAPES-sponsored PhD candidate at the Royal College of Music in London, where he investigates the chamber music of Ferdinand Rebay. Since 2003, Luiz has been teaching guitar and chamber music at the State University of Santa Catarina, in Florianópolis, Brazil. http://www.luizmantovani.com

Cla Mathieu

Cla Mathieu (Switzerland) obtained certificates of advanced studies in guitar performance from the University of music Lausanne/Sion and MA-degrees in classical guitar performance and pedagogy at the universities of music in Basel and Bern. He currently works on a Ph.D.-thesis on early-twentieth-century performance practice on the guitar with a focus on Miguel Llobet and his recordings at the Graduate School of the Arts in Bern. His publications include a study on nineteen-century guitar transcriptions as sources for vocal performance practice as well as an article on dislocation in twentieth-century guitar playing.

Vinciane Trancart (2016 Andrew Britton Fellow)

Dr. Vinciane Trancart is senior lecturer at Limoges University (France) and was the first holder of the Andrew Britton Fellowship (2016). Her research involves music in the field of cultural history of contemporary Spain. Her 2014 PhD (Foreign Languages and Literatures, La Sorbonne Nouvelle – Paris 3) focused on guitar and national identity in Spain during the Bourbon Restoration. In 2019, a book based on this work entitled “Visiones desafinadas. Prácticas y representaciones de la guitarra en Madrid y Andalucía (1883-1922)” (Prensas de la Universidad de Zaragoza – Colección De Arte) will be published. More research works can be found here.