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Samuel Bonnet

Montreal-based Jazz guitarist

About Me

With a classical and jazz background, guitarist Samuel Bonnet's music is at the crossroads of several musical universes, somewhere between the natural resonance of classical guitar’s nylon strings and jazz improvisation. Through his music, Samuel Bonnet tells us his intimate and personal story in continuous dialogue with his plural roots.

Born in 1980 in Haifa, Israel, Samuel Bonnet moved to the Paris region of France at a very young age and began playing classical guitar at the age of 8. At the age of 13, he took private lessons in jazz guitar and began performing professionally at the age of 16. After a year of training in Brazilian guitar and jazz harmony at the ATLA school in 1999, he obtained a degree in musicology at the University of Paris 8 in 2005. During his years of study in Paris, he had the opportunity to attend master classes with Sylvain Luc, Paul Bley, Steve Coleman, Mal Waldron and Wadada Léo Smith.

In 2009, he moved to Montreal to pursue a master's degree in classical guitar performance under the tutelage of Peter McCutcheon at the Université de Montréal, which he obtained in 2012. He then participated twice in the Académie Musicale du Domaine Forget (Charlevoix) and took master classes in classical guitar with Roland Dyens, Bruce Holzman and Jorge Caballero.

In 2022, he was awarded a scholarship to participate in the Alternative Guitar Summit in the New York area, with Kurt Rosenwinkel, Bill Frisell, Gilad Hekselman, John Scofield, Julian Lage, Mike and Leni Stern as guest teachers.

He has released 4 albums acclaimed by the press (Le Devoir, Ici Musique...), received several awards and grants (Vision Diversité, Arts Council, LOJIQ...), and shared the stage and studio with renowned artists such as Joe Magnarelli, Daniel Sadownick, Luques Curtis, Jacques Schwartz-Bart, Fraser Hollins, Carlos Jimenez, Alon Farber, Susana Behar, Jose Luiz de la Paz or the Israeli oud player Yaïr Dalal.

He has performed with various projects (Oriental Blue, Samuel Bonnet 4tet, Ensemble Tessala, LEV) on concert tours in North America, Europe and the Middle East, including the Montreal International Jazz Festival, the Montreal Sefarad Festival and the Festival Musique en Devoluy (France), as well as in jazz clubs such as the Rex Jazz Club (Toronto), the Upstairs Jazz Club (Montreal), the Yellow Submarine (Jerusalem) and the Rockwood Music Hall (New York).

Very involved in education, Samuel Bonnet has been teaching classical and jazz guitar at the École de Musique Vincent d'Indy since 2017.