Thomas Echols’s work is an amalgam of classical, jazz, modernist, and pop music forays.

As visiting artistic director for Austin Classical Guitar (Summer of 2015), Thomas curated programs incorporating traditional instrumental recitalists, experimental electronics, newly commissioned works, and interactive visual projections. He has recorded and performed with the Grammy­ Nominated choral ensemble Conspirare and the Houston Symphony Orchestra (the latter’s recording of Wozzeck recently won a Grammy and the prestigious Echo Klassik award for best operatic recording), and has had major engagements at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Palazzo Chigi (Siena, Italy), The Whittier Bach Festival (LA, The Blanton Museum of Art (Austin), Jones Hall (Houston), and other venues around the world.

His experimental-pop alter ego, Man, Woman, Friend, Computer, creates deconstructed pop songs that unfold into meandering compositions, synth fetishism, polyrhythmic laments, bebop ballads, and somnambulist visions –with a spontaneous interplay between performer and the generative algorithms of his custom software. MWFC’s debut album has garnered rave reviews from Austin Monthly and The Austin Chronicle, which calls it “Meditative and fetching . . . he ventures into a complex amalgam of analog and synth. Wistful, romantic. . . Echols’ vocals sooth to surrender.” As a classical guitarist, music technologist, composer, and song writer, Thomas is a mainstay in the thriving classical guitar and experimental music scenes in Austin. Thomas is active as a performer and lecturer, and he has contributed scholarly articles to Soundboard Magazine.

Thomas’s popular YouTube channel “The Labyrinth of Limitations” combines his work as an educator, theorist, composer, jazz improviser, and music technologist to teach the concepts of the great jazz pianist and teacher Barry Harris.

Thomas Echols holds degrees from the University of Southern California (Doctor of Musical Arts), the University of Texas (Master of Music), the University of Colorado (Bachelor of Music), and the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy (Diploma di Merito).