Alfredo Balcacer
Alfredo Balcacer is currently an instructor of record of music technology at the University of Northern Colorado where he is pursuing a doctorate of musical arts in jazz studies and composition. He holds a Master’s in Music in Jazz Studies from Western Michigan University and a Bachelor of Music in guitar performance from Utah State University. As an educator, Alfredo has vast experience teaching music history, music appreciation, guitar, and rock-blues ensembles at several schools in the Dominican Republic. While at Utah State University, Alfredo worked as a guitar pedagogy consultant for Utah’s premier education company, Consonus Music Institute. While pursing his Master’s degree from WMU, he worked as a guitar and ukulele instructor in at Southtown Guitar, Marshall Music, and Crescendo Academy of Music. He also worked at WMU’s Seminar summer camp as an instructor of music technology and as a visiting artist at the Kalamazoo Education for the Arts.
Outside of his higher education teaching experience, performing music of a diverse array of genres, including merengue, bachata, salsa, cumbia, bolero, rock, pop, funk/disco, jazz, big band jazz, and metal. He has performed in hundreds of different concerts in the Dominican Republic, including world-recognized venues such as Altos De Chavon and Hard Rock Cafe. During his time at Utah State University, Alfredo was member of USU’s premier small ensemble, the Caine Jazz Combo, and USU’s Jazz Big Band, earning a Downbeat Award for best performance for a Large Ensemble. As part of several ensembles, and as an attendee of various masterclasses at Western Michigan University and other areas, Alfredo had the curricular opportunity to perform with: Peter Erskine, George Garzone, Randy Brecker, Cedric Dent, Philip Catherine, Peter Bernstein, and Peter Eldrige from the New York Voices. As part of WMU’s Gold Company Vocal Ensemble, he toured Canada. An important part of Alfredo’s journey at Western Michigan was forming part of the Latin Ensemble at WMU, Más Que Nada. Their recording Sea Journey earned the ensemble a DownBeat Award for best student Latin recording of the year.
Alfredo’s first original album release was “Suspended Sea.” In this record he blended Dominican and American music, focusing on the explosiveness of Latin rhythms, and the beautiful and rich harmonic palette of American jazz. As reviewed by Dan Billawsky from All About Jazz, “this young guitarist colors the ears impressed.”
In pursuit of creating better learning experiences for his students, Alfredo’s teaching philosophy focuses on adjusting the material to the student’s needs and creating logical lines of communication with his students. He now teaches online lessons for Crescendo Academy.
