Home » Member Page

Alan Kwan

New York based jazz guitarist

About Me

Alan Kwan Guitarist / Composer / Educator

Alan Kwan is a jazz guitarist, composer, and educator who is currently based in New York City.

Kwan was born in Hong Kong and started playing guitar at the age of 14; after 4 years of musical training, he decided to devote himself to jazz and studied with Ted Lo and Eugene Pao, two of the most distinguished jazz musicians in the city, before embarking on his journey as a jazz artist. Within a few years, Kwan became one of the most active jazz musicians in Hong Kong.

In 2009, Kwan moved to the United States to further pursue his studies in music. He has studied with Fred Hamilton, Richard McClure, and Noel Johnston at the University of North Texas, where he was the recipient of the College of Music Scholarship, Kris Kolflat Scholarship, and Academic Scholarship. He has also studied privately with David Berkman, Paul Bollenback, Stefan Karlsson, Quamon Fowler, Rodney Jones, Nir Felder, Ben Monder, Mike Moreno, Bruce Saunders, John Stowell, Clint Strong, as well as many other renowned musicians. In 2015, he took his pursuit of jazz further by completing Master of Music in Jazz Performance at Queens College, where he concurrently tapped into the New York jazz scene.

Apart from New York and Hong Kong, Kwan has also performed in Texas, Tokyo and Taiwan. He has performed with a number of well known jazz musicians including Dayna Stephens, Fabian Almazan, Orlando Le Fleming, Glenn Zaleski, Paul Bollenback, Sean Wayland, David Smith, George Delancey, and Curtis Graham Nowosad with performances ranging from jazz gigs, stage performances to outdoor performances, such as the Our Hong Kong Young Notes Concert organized by Radio Television Hong Kong and the KoSwing Big Band Summer Jazz Camp in Tainan. He has invited by the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in New York (HKETONY)to perform at different occasions, including the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region 20th Anniversary Gala Dinner under the presence of Carrie Lam, the then Chief Secretary for Administration of Hong Kong. He is also an active participant of different festivals, including the Hong Kong International Jazz Festival, Hong Kong Tap Festival, Denton Jazz Festival, and the Hong Kong Jazz Education Festival, where he performed with Grammy nominee Dr. Gene Aitken.

Alongside his performance career, Kwan has been invited to teach master classes in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and was a semi-finalist of the 2016 and 2017 International Songwriting Competition.

Kwan is currently an endorsed artist of La Bella Strings (http://www.labella.com/) and Furch Guitar (http://www.furch.cz/en/)