Thad Bonduris said he went back to school to fulfill an ambition that had been on hold for years.

Thad Bonduris

The musician watched his private studio grow, a snug space just off the downtown Denton Square. He saw weekends and evenings filled with gigs playing guitar in bands around Dallas, Fort Worth and Denton. He wove his personal relationships around time with students — teaching guitar, bouzouki, banjo and mandolin — and performances.

He finally went back to his alma mater, the University of North Texas, for a master’s degree in music education, and left  with an unlikely lesson plan: to teach teens, 20-somethings and baby boomers how to form a rock band.

“Yeah, it’s not something you’d expect to find, a class or private lessons that teach a band how to do the whole band thing. But I’m doing it,” Bonduris said. “My graduate adviser, Donna Emmanuel,  really took off with the idea, looking at it as a way to offer an alternative to the community bands that are real popular and all.

“It’s kind of funny, because in a way, it’s something I’ve been doing for a long time in bands I’ve played in, but it’s more oriented to my studio.”

DRC/Lucinda Breeding

Julian Keeton, 13, takes off on a guitar solo during rock band lessons on a recent Thursday night. Small groups attend private lessons where they can play guitar, bass, keyboard or drums in a jam session that teaches technique, listening and transitions — the very skills rock bands need to keep audiences satisfied.

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Bonduris came to Denton when UNT was seeing some shifts in its flagship jazz program.

“When I got to UNT in 1974, the College of Music was just starting to offer classical guitar lessons, not a degree program,” Bonduris said. “I never had a private jazz guitar lesson at the college. Jack Petersen started the program for jazz guitar, and I went from there into the lab band.”

The lab bands are perhaps the most celebrated aspects of the UNT jazz program, putting students into big band ensembles where they learn to play together, arrange music and compose their own works.

Bonduris got into music as a teenager, when British music invaded popular culture and captured the imagination of a generation born between World War II and the Vietnam War. He listened to AM radio religiously, hearing Perry Como, Buck Owens, the Ramsey Lewis Trio, the Bert Kaempfert Orchestra and Motown in a single hour of programming. It looked like Bonduris might become a drummer, but he ended up playing guitar instead.

“I and other eighth-graders were denied entrance into the school band, as we had not started the year before,” Bonduris writes in an essay about his history and its influence on his rock band curriculum. “With no instruction, I had the same type of informal learning as many of my peers did, using observation, ear ‘straining’ and whatever shards of information there were available at the time. Within months, I started leading garage bands until beginning a professional career that got put on hold as I’d made the decision to enter music school.”

Bonduris started his popular guitar studio after he enrolled at UNT. His bank of students got large enough to keep him in lessons for hours and on the weekends.

During his teaching career, he’s witnessed the guitar become more popular in public school music programs. Band leaders are starting to teach the instrument, and at least one band teacher has a guitar ensemble that performs arrangements of symphonic and orchestral music.

“I see a real opportunity to shore up the jazz ensembles in public schools,” Bonduris said.

As he pursued his master’s degree, Bonduris was asked to create a “project practicum.”

“That part of the degree plan asks you to create some kind of model for the kind of music teaching you’re wanting to do,” he said. “When I talked to my professor about what I was thinking about, she took off on the idea and it turned into this curriculum.”

Bonduris wants his students to be able to handle music from the late 1960s to the present.

“What I want to give these students is a working knowlege of the basic tools required to play all styles of rock, blues and basic country — an ‘ear,’ how to listen for what a song does and where it goes, and some improvisation, all in a hands-on class setting,” Bonduris said. “We’re highly encouraging using notation, but we're not concentrating on it. We’re teaching them how to play together as an ensemble. Theses are all the things I wish I’d been taught when I started playing.

“Teaching theory can never exceed application. When you start throwing a lot of theory at students, it can scare them."

A recent Thursday night rock band class illustrates his curriculum. Teacher Pablo Burrull led a group of students through a medley of rock standards. A local drummer kept rhythm for students Shane Connor, 12, Jordan Smith, 12, and Julian Keeton, 13. Shane plays bass, and Jordan and Julian play guitar. They don’t study charts. They play. The lesson is predictably loud and the studio smells like paper and sweaty teenage boys. A tower fan is on high. A copy of Stick Control for the Snare Drummer sits unopened on a music stand.

“Hey! Jimmy Page never yawned!” Burrull jokes to one of the band members who strums while sleepy.

He takes the guys through “Sunshine of Your Love” by Cream and a song by Three Doors Down. Shane suggests they transition into Aerosmith’s “Walk This Way” and they do. They swap solos, and the transitions get better after Burrull makes them try it half-tempo and again at the right tempo. As they concentrate, the boys’ jaws go slack, and it’s too soon for anyone to take on vocals.

The boys said they were happy to have a laboratory where they could try out their private pickings.

“I started learning by watching lessons on YouTube,” Shane said.

“I had a guitar teacher for a while, and I wanted to keep up with it,” said Jordan, who was also in the guitar club at Woodrow Wilson Elementary.

Julian learned the basics for guitar by himself before taking lessons.

The three boys said they’re learning important things in their lessons. “We all have to be on cue,” Shane said. “Everybody counts as much as everyone else. If you’re learning on your own, you don’t get that part of it.”

“Timing is hard,” Jordan said. “You also have to make sure no one is louder than anyone else. Playing together means you can’t get too loud.”

Julian said the drills during lessons make it possible to get into the zone, where things feel free and easy.

“I like when we get it right, and the melody just flows. It’s an accomplishment. It sounds easy to do, but it’s not.”

Burrull said the curriculum puts players together based on skill level — something that can’t be known until students play together. Burrull said he was pleased with Shane, Julian and Jordan’s progress.

“They got through a whole song,” he said. “Everybody’s looking at each other, giving each other cues. That’s a skill you won’t get playing by yourself.

“I don’t rush things. Eventually, I do want them to write their own material. That’s the goal of any band.”

The students said they plan to be in their own bands once they learn to play more confidently, but they also consider themselves a band.

Jordan even tossed out some names.

“I like the Awesome People or the Thrilly Billies,” he said.

“Yeah! I like the Thrilly Billies,” Julian said.

Bonduris said he plans to offer the classes to teens and adults as long as they want it.

“I want to see where this goes,” he said. “I don't know of anyone else who is combining total musicianship with rock and roll." 

For more information, contact Bonduris’ studio at 940-320-6023.

LUCINDA BREEDING can be reached at 940-566-6877. Her e-mail address is cbreeding@dentonrc.com.