Roger Filiberto, 94, Guitar Instructor
Submitted by N.O.V.A. July 2005
Times Picayune	07-30-1998


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Roger Filiberto, who taught guitar to thousands of New Orleanians and gained an
international reputation writing music instruction books, died July 23. He was 94.

Mr. Filiberto, who wrote the world's top-selling book on how to play the electric bass,
died of respiratory failure at a hospital near his son's home in Oakland, Ark.

Mr. Filiberto was born in New York City and lived in New Orleans for 84 years before
moving to Arkansas in 1996 to live with his son, Guy.

Over seven decades, Mr. Filiberto led the Filiberto Mandolin and Guitar Orchestra and
taught banjo and guitar at Werlein's and Grunwald's music stores and in his own studio
and store in New Orleans.

"Roger was one of the finest guitar teachers in the country for many, many years," his
publisher Bill Bay said.

Mr. Filiberto's "Electric Bass Method," first published in 1963, has sold almost 2
million copies, making it the top-selling electric-bass instruction book in the world,
said Bay, president of Mel Bay Publications Inc. in Pacific, Mo.

In a 1993 interview, Mr. Filiberto said he didn't set out to make music his life. But
as a young man he fell in love with the sound of a banjo he heard at the Elmer Candy
Co.'s July 4th company picnic. After the picnic, he climbed on a train with the banjo
player and had his first lesson on the way home.

He bought a banjo that week. His mother, a piano teacher, taught him to read music, and
he learned to play the banjo in two months. Not long after that, he was giving lessons
and playing in bands instead of working for the candy company.

Eventually, he started Filiberto Studio, and at one point in the 1960s he and his
teachers had 1,176 students.

Mr. Filiberto wrote 16 books for Mel Bay Publications. He continued teaching and
playing in a banjo band even after turning 90.

"I'm not in it for the miserable bucks I make," he said. "You teach music because you
want people to learn music."

He attended St. Aloysius School in New Orleans and was a member of the Music Guild.

Besides his son, survivors include a daughter, Claudia Filiberto of Metairie; a sister,
Henrietta Wedell of Chalmette; three grandchildren; and a great-grandchild.

The funeral was held Tuesday at All Faiths Funeral Home in New Orleans. Burial was in
Metairie Cemetery.