Ronny Lee

Ronald Leventhal (March 2, 1927 – April 22, 2015), known professionally as Ronny Lee, was an American guitarist who wrote method books and taught at Kingsborough Community College of the City University of New York.

He wrote popular, classical, and rock guitar arrangements for Hansen Publications, Sam Fox Publishing Company, and Alfred Music.

He conducted workshops and seminars for music teachers was a judge at music festivals.

Lee performed in clubs, in jazz, rock and pop recording sessions, at resort hotels, and in a concert with the New York Philharmonic.

He accompanied singers Eydie Gormé and Fran Warren.

Ronald Leventhal was born in the Bronx, New York on March 2, 1927.

He was an only child, the son of Abraham Leventhal and Shirley Edelstein.

At the age of twelve his aunt presented him with a guitar she had won in a raffle.

Leventhal was educated at the William Taft High School.

At the age of fourteen his interest in music became quite strong, and he began to devote much more time to playing.

His father, sensing his son's greatly increased interest, bought Ronald Leventhal a D'Angelico guitar.

At sixteen—having adopted the professional name Ronny Lee—he appeared as a featured soloist on local radio station WNEW's Bobby Sox Canteen Show.

As the show was being prepared to go on network radio, Lee turned eighteen and was drafted "shortly after his eighteenth birthday".

Since that birthday was March 2, 1945, we can assume he would have arrived at a military camp by April 1, 1945.

If Lee was drafted into the U. S. Army ground forces to serve as a rifleman—the most needed speciality, he would then have received 17 weeks of training before being considered ready to report to a front-line unit.

By August 1, 1945, World War II had been over in Europe for nearly 3 months.

After the first atomic bomb was successfully exploded at Alamogordo on July 16, and even more after atomic bombs were dropped on Japan on August 6 and 9, it was obvious that a U. S. land invasion of the main islands of Japan would not be necessary.

When Lee was discharged, he studied engineering—funded by the G. I. Bill —at the RCA Institutes of Technology.

At the same time he played club dates and taught guitar to a limited number of students.

Lee studied guitar privately with Shadow Ferber, Anthony Antone, John Sigelitto, Nicholas DeBonis, Hy White, Charles Ruoff, and Juan De la Mata—with whom he later wrote "Flamenco Guitar Method".

At the end of his studies, Lee decided to become a professional musician.

He worked with "society" orchestras, and filled out his daily schedule by teaching guitar students at their homes.

He played at resort hotels in the Catskills and New Jersey during the summer months, often as a classical and jazz soloist or accompanying recording stars There Lee acquired experience as a "pit musician"; he frequently read from violin and conductor parts while backing up vocal, dance, comedy, and novelty acts.

Lee opened his first guitar studio in November 1954.

He created many original lessons for his students, thus beginning his writing career.

Aided by his wife Frances—whom he married in 1957—he opened a larger midtown Manhattan studio and store in 1959 at 255 West 55th St., employing four guitar instructors.

Visitors to the studio included astronauts (as store customers) John Glenn and Scott Carpenter, numerous show business personalities, and many of the nation’s leading guitarists.

At Kingsborough Community College of the City University of New York, Lee taught Jazz alongside his colleagues Lee Konitz, famed jazz saxophonist, and guitarist Robert Spellman in the Music Division—directed by Morris Lang—of the Center for the Performing Arts.

He was appointed guitar editor of Guitar World Magazine, for which he also wrote the Guitar Book Review column.

Lee’s repeatedly-expressed view was that "It is quite possible for the student to devote one half hour to one hour of adequate music practice each day and make adequate progress on his instrument."

From 1959 Lee began accepting dates for occasional recording sessions.

Over the years he accompanied such singers as Eydie Gormé and Fran Warren.

Lee’s first appearance at Carnegie Hall was as guitar accompanist to the Pilar Gomez Spanish Ballet troupe in 1962.

He taught guitar teachers at a Louisville KY convention in 1964, at a Pittsburgh PA sponsored workshop in the spring of 1968, at a Des Plaines IL convention in July 1977, and at a Cumberland MD sponsored workshop in June 1979.

Lee also officiated as an adjudicator at major music festivals.

Using his engineering background, Lee invented an electronic "guitar conversion kit" that converted an electric guitar into a bass guitar in 5 seconds.

It was sold by Imperial Creations in New York for $12.50.

In March 1968 Lee played in a Lincoln Center benefit concert for the New York Philharmonic Orchestra's Pension Fund, in a concert version of Oklahoma! featuring Howard Da Silva, who played Jud Fry in the original Broadway production.

The performance was conducted by Skitch Henderson, with Richard Rodgers himself coming out to conduct the Encore.

In 1969, Lee played tenor banjo and guitar with the Philharmonic, under the direction of Andre Kostelanetz—with Veronica Tyler and Robert Mosley—performing excerpts from the Gershwins' Porgy and Bess.