Acclaimed for her extraordinary lyricism, technique and versatility, GRAMMY Award winner Sharon Isbin has been hailed as "the pre-eminent guitarist of our time." She is also the winner of the Toronto, Munich, and Madrid International Competitions, and Guitar Player magazine's "Best Classical Guitarist" award. She gives sold-out performances in the world's greatest halls, including New York's Carnegie and Avery Fisher Halls, Boston's Symphony Hall, and Washington D.C.'s Kennedy Center, and has served as Artistic Director/Soloist of festivals she created for Carnegie Hall, the Ordway Music Theatre in St. Paul, New York's 92 nd Street Y, and National Public Radio. She is a frequent guest on national radio programs including St. Paul Sunday,411 Things Considered, and Garrison Keillor's,4 Prairie Home Companion. She has been profiled nationally on CBS Sunday Morning and in periodicals from People to Elle, as well as featured on the cover of more than 20 magazines.

      Ms. Isbin's numerous recordings - from Baroque, Spanish/Latin and 20^th Century to crossover and jazzfusion - have received many awards, including "Critic's Choice Recording of the Year" in Gramophone and CD Review, "Recording of the Month" in Stereo Review, and "Album of the Year" in Guitar Player. An exclusive Teldec Classics artist, her Dreams of a World: Folk-inspired Music for Guitar soared onto top classical Billboard charts, edging out The 3 Tenors, and earned her a 2001 GRAMMY Award for "Best Instrumental Soloist" making her the first classical guitarist to receive a GRAMMY in 28 years. Her Journey to the 4mazon with Brazilian percussionist Thiago de Mello and saxophonist Paul Winter hit the top Billboard charts in both the U.S. and the U.K. and received a 1999 GRAMMY nomination for "Best Classical Crossover Album." Her May 2001 Teldec release features the world prerniere recording of concerti written for her by Christopher Rouse and Tan Dun. Other recent CDs include Wayfaring Stranger (Erato) with mezzo-soprano Susanne Mentzer, and Aaron Jay Kernis' Double Concerto (Argo/Decca) with violinist Cho-Liang Lin and the SPCO which received a 2000 GRAMMY nomination. Her six best-selling titles for EMINirgin Classics include JS. Bach Complete Lute Suites (her pioneering editions created with Bach specialist Rosalyn Tureck), and Rodrigo: Convierto de Aranjuez which Joaquin Rodrigo praised as "magnificent."

      Acclaimed for expanding the guitar repertoire with some of the finest new works of the century, Ms. Isbin has commissioned and prerniered nine concerti. Her American Landscapes (EMI/Virgin Classics) features concerti written for her by Corigliano, Schwantner, and Foss, and in January 2000, she premiered a concerto by Rouse with Eschenbach and the NDR Symphony followed by Litton and the Dallas Symphony. Other cornposers who have written for her include Tower, Rorem, Diamond, Kernis, and Brouwer.

      In the last two seasons, Ms. Isbin performed over 90 concerts, and her 2000-01 season includes concerts in New York City, Washington D.C., Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Seattle, Minneapolis, Columbus, Holland, and Italy.

      Ms. Isbin tours Europe annually, and has also toured Japan and the Far East, New Zealand, South America, Mexico and Israel. Festivals include Mostly Mozart, Aspen, Santa Fe, Hong Kong, Montreux, Strasbourg, Paris, Athens, Istanbul and Budapest. She has appeared as soloist with over 140 orchestras, including the Orchestre National de France, London, National, Houston, Baltimore, Dallas, Minnesota, St. Louis, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Phoenix, BBC Scottish, and Tokyo Symphonies, as well as the St. Paul, New York, Los Angeles and Scottish Chamber Orchestras. She toured with jazz greats Laurindo Almeida, Larry Coryell, Herb Ellis, Stanley Jordan, and the late Michael Hedges, and has performed with Nigel Kennedy, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Denyce Graves, the Emerson String Quartet, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and on the New York Philharmonic series. She also collaborated with Antonio Carlos Jobim and has shared the stage with luminaries from Aretha Franklin to Muhammad Ali.

      Author of the Classical Guitar Answer Book, Ms. Isbin is Director of the guitar departments at the Aspen Music Festival and the Juilliard School, which she created in 1989. She studied with Andr6s Segovia, Oscar Ghiglia and Rosalyn Tureck. Visit her on the internet at www.sharonisbin.com