Richard “Rico” Stover was an American guitarist, scholar, and advocate for the music of Paraguayan composer-guitarist Agustín Barrios. Born in Iowa and raised largely in Fresno, California, he earned a degree in Latin American ethnomusicology at UC Santa Cruz and studied guitar in Spain and later with notable teachers such as José Rey de la Torre. Over his long career he became the foremost authority on Barrios, publishing a landmark biography Six Silver Moonbeams, editing Barrios’s works, and contributing dozens of articles to leading guitar journals. He also founded the classical guitar nail system “Rico Nails,” traveled throughout Latin America researching Barrios’s life, and influenced generations of classical guitarists.
Stover’s papers document Barrios music and life as well as Latin American guitar composers who were contemporaries of Barrios. The collection includes Stover's writings, research files, scores, photographs, and other primary source documents critical for understanding Barrios life and times.
A companion collection is the Greg Scholl Collection of Agustin Barrios Mangoré Recordings in honor of John and Jody Arnhold with many of Barrios' 78rpm recordings. A Barrios discography and digitized 78rpm recordings are available in the Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR).
The Stover collection is currently being processed and a finding aid soon available in the Online Archive of California.
For more information on the collection or assistance in using the materials, please contact Special Collections staff at special@library.ucsb.edu.
