Frederick Noad (b. August 8, 1929 – d. September 13, 2001) was a Belgian classical guitar performer, educator, and an original founder of the Guitar Foundation of America.
Noad was famed for his popular instructional television show, Guitar with Frederick Noad which was originally televised on PBS in the mid-1960s, resyndicated in color in the early 1980s, and continues to be broadcast today.
Born in Blankenberge, Belgium, Noad moved at an early age with his family to Eversley, England and was originally introduced to music through the violin and piano. As a young teenager Noad started playing the guitar, which quickly became his favorite instrument.
Noad took a nontraditional path to becoming a professional musician. He received a liberal arts education at Wellington college, earning degrees in a wide variety of disciplines including ancient history, Latin, Greek, and literature. He later earned his masters degree in jurisprudence at Oxford University.
After graduating from college, Noad found work in America working for J Arthur Rank Films Company. But restructuring made his job redundant and forced him to look for new work. It was at this point that Noad decided to pursue a career in music. He started a small music business in Hollywood, California called the Spanish Guitar Center where he offered music lessons and sold imported classical guitars from famous makers in Spanish cities such as Cordoba and Granada. He also continued his own study under Spanish guitar virtuoso Andrés Segovia during Segovia's renowned professional classes at Música en Compostela in Spain and also under English classical player Julian Bream.
Noad soon established himself as a skilled performer and began teaching music at the college level at the University of California, Irvine and the California Institute of the Arts. He also authored several instructional guitar books many focusing on classical guitar playing, but some also encompassing a wide varitety of other styles such as travis picking, folk and country, flamenco, Latin rhythms, the blues, and rock and roll.
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