Paul O'Dette

Paul Raymond O'Dette (born February 2, 1954) is an American lutenist, conductor, and musicologist specializing in early music.

O'Dette, who was born in Pittsburgh, began playing the electric guitar in a rock band in Columbus, Ohio, where he grew up.

Eventually, this led him into playing guitar transcriptions of lute music, and not long after that he opted for the lute (as well as the related archlute, theorbo, and Baroque guitar) as his primary instruments, and now he specializes in the performance of Renaissance and Baroque music.

In addition to his activities as a performer, Paul O'Dette is an avid researcher, having worked extensively on the performance and sources of seventeenth-century Italian and English solo song, continuo practices and lute technique.

He lives in Rochester, New York with his wife Christel Thielmann, who is also a baroque music specialist and Eastman professor.