Andrew
Venet

BA, Music Composition — Georgia State University, 2020

Andrew Venet is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, and teacher based in Atlanta, Georgia, with 20 years of experience playing and four years of experience teaching guitar, piano, and bass.

He started studying classical piano at age 8, added electric bass and guitar at 11, and picked up cello at 13 — the same year he began playing his own music at live rock shows around Atlanta. At Henderson Middle School and Lakeside High School he played cello in the school orchestra and electric bass in the jazz band, while performing with a string of original punk and blues bands, all while studying classical piano privately with Malen Zabinski and electric bass with Mike Cady.

After high school, Andrew played professionally around Atlanta — in his own bands and as a freelance musician for weddings, restaurants, and everything in between. A 2015 composition commission from a Decatur-based dance company sparked an interest that led him to audition for Georgia State University's Composition Program; he was accepted with a partial scholarship in 2016. The jazz program required a classical instrument, so despite never having played it, Andrew was admitted to study upright bass — learning it with Billy Thornton alongside composition with Dr. Hanna Lisa-Stefansson, and completing his degree in the spring of 2020.

Alongside his own bands, Andrew has worked as a pit musician for musical theater productions including Matilda, Hadestown, Newsies, and Little Shop of Horrors — the latter staged under a big-top tent at Art Farm at Serenbe in 2024, starring American Idol alumni Diana DeGarmo and Melinda Doolittle. He's also appeared on television with Fooshee's Forecast, performing on Georgia Public Broadcasting's Peach Jam.

He began teaching private guitar, piano, bass, and composition lessons while still at Georgia State, and joined Guitar Center Marietta in 2020. As a teacher, Andrew fosters students' personal connection to music so they can learn more about themselves and have an outlet to communicate with others — and works to show them that practicing is fun, not a chore. They call it "playing" for a reason.