Our Instructor’s Bios

Bill Barrett‘s career spans 3 decades performing and recording with the likes of the L.A. Philharmonic, Natalie Merchant, The Kronos Quartet, Gangbe Brass Band, members of Black Flag and Nels Cline. He is currently in the acclaimed New York roots ensemble Hazmat Modine and guitarist Marc Ford’s Neptune Blues Club. Bill fronts the manouche quartet The Bastards of Belleville, Dick Deluxe Band and the local roots collective, Claremont Voodoo Society. His most recent CD release is Music for American Gypsy Souls, a collaboration with long time friend Eric Holden.

Bill has been teaching diatonic and chromatic harmonica classes and lessons for the Folk Music Center since 2007. He teaches at the beginning, intermediate and advanced levels in any style: rock, country, blues, jazz and gypsy jazz.

Ellen Chase has been around the folk music scene her whole life. Her mother, Dorothy performed and taught at Hecht House in the 1950s in Boston with Bess Lomax Hawes. Ellen began working at the Folk Music Center with her grandfather when she was in junior high school and has performed and taught guitar and banjo ever since. After graduating from Pitzer and acquiring a Ph.D at the Claremont Graduate University, she taught reading and language acquisition at Pacific Oaks and Cal State San Bernardino. In 2001 Ellen took over the Folk Music Center from her parents and currently runs the shop, concert series, folk festival and teaches music classes: 5 string banjo, Intro to Ukulele, Blues Ukulele, Country/Bluegrass Ukulele, autoharp, and guitar.

Jerry O’Sullivan has been playing in bands since he was 13 and has been a professional musician since the age of 21 when he wrote and performed the hit song Pomona Queen. He currently plays guitar and is the lead vocalist for the band CVS, (Claremont Voodoo Society.)

Jerry has been teaching ukulele since 2005 when he joined the Folk Music Center. He and Ellen Chase co-teach several ukulele workshops:

Introduction to the Ukulele: a workshop where beginners learn to hold, strum and tune their uke as well as basic chords and lots of easy songs.

Blues Ukulele: a lesson in basic 12 bar blues strums and rhythms, some intros, endings and riffs, and several songs. Knowledge of basic chords is helpful for this workshop.

Lance has played guitar since age 14 and now holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Music with an emphasis in guitar from the University of La Verne in Southern California.  His musical range on the guitar covers several styles including classical, flamenco, rock and blues. Lance demonstrated his passion for music education in his role as Professor Michael Ryan’s teaching assistant at the University of La Verne and later as a guitar teacher at local area high schools.  He is currently accepting private guitar, piano and voice students at the Folk Music Center.