Here are Your Chief Judges

Introducing the Chief Judges for the competition. Yes, this time round we will have a different Chief Judge for each of the 3 competition categories. Each Chief Judge will be assisted by another 2 different judges to determine the outcome of the competition.

Hikaru Tanimoto hails from Hokkaido, Japan and started playing the guitar at age 16, started his professional career at age 17 and practiced at least 15 hours every day in order to improve his technique. Hikaru’s playing style is very unique and offers wonderful alternatives to traditional guitar concepts. Hehas provided music for many projects including the Nissan automobile advertising campaign, National Health Insurance of Japan adverts, and the music for Sonic the Hedgehog Sega video games. He has toured Germany, Spain, France, Philippines, China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand and Korea and has appeared on TV in the Philippines, China and Korea.

Sheikh Hady Basmeih (aka Hady Afro) hails from a musical family in Kuala Lumpur. Hady took his first musical steps at the age of 8 by learning the piano from his father. It wasn’t until he was 17 that Hady’s father taught him to play the classical guitar, theory and how to read music. Over the next few years he honed his skills as a guitarist developing a unique style that was an amalgamation of his ever expanding musical tastes. He studied and obtained a Diploma in 2008 and graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree (Majoring in Classical Guitar and Music Arrangement) in 2012 from ASWARA. He has been interviewed by the MIRROR magazine and is recognized as a role model for Malaysian Youth on Unity in 2011. Hady was also interviewed by Buletin Beringin magazine upon winning 1st runner-up during the 1st Malaysian International Guitar Festival (MIGFEST) and Competition in 2007.

Victor Ng is a full-time guitarist, performer and educator who hails from Bukit Mertajam. He started on the classical guitar for a couple of years only to switch to fingerstyle and jazz being influenced by such greats like Martin Taylor and Joe Pass. Today, he is more into fingerstyle guitar and gets his inspiration mainly from the likes of guitarists such as Tommy Emmanuel, Chet Atkins, Jerry Reed and most recently, Jon Gomm. With these influences overencompassing him, he has managed to twirl them into his unique blend of instrumental fingerstyle guitar incorporating traditional thumbpicking and modern percussive style playing.