Ronald Leventhal (March 2, 1927 – April 22, 2015), known professionally as Ronny Lee, was an American guitarist who wrote method books and taught at Kingsborough Community College of the City University of New York.

He wrote popular, classical, and rock guitar arrangements for Hansen Publications, Sam Fox Publishing Company, and Alfred Music.

Lee performed in clubs, in jazz, rock and pop recording sessions, at resort hotels, and in a concert with the New York Philharmonic.

[1] At sixteen—having adopted the professional name Ronny Lee—he appeared as a featured soloist on local radio station WNEW's Bobby Sox Canteen Show.

If Lee was drafted into the U. S. Army ground forces to serve as a rifleman—the most needed speciality,[5] he would then have received 17 weeks of training before being considered ready to report to a front-line unit.

He played at resort hotels in the Catskills and New Jersey during the summer months, often as a classical and jazz soloist or accompanying recording stars[3] There Lee acquired experience as a "pit musician"; he frequently read from violin and conductor parts while backing up vocal, dance, comedy, and novelty acts.

[9] Lee's first appearance at Carnegie Hall was as guitar accompanist to the Pilar Gomez Spanish Ballet troupe in 1962.

[12] In 1969, Lee played tenor banjo and guitar with the Philharmonic, under the direction of Andre Kostelanetz—with Veronica Tyler and Robert Mosley—performing excerpts from the Gershwins' Porgy and Bess.

Aided by his wife Frances—whom he married in 1957—he opened a larger midtown Manhattan studio and store in 1959 at 255 West 55th St., employing four guitar instructors.

[1] Visitors to the studio included astronauts (as store customers) John Glenn and Scott Carpenter,[15] numerous show business personalities, and many of the nation's leading guitarists.

[31] For Sam Fox Publishing Co. in 1972, he arranged "Magical Melodies: for guitar"——which included music and lyrics by Lerner and Loewe and John Denver.

[39] He retained or re-acquired the copyrights to these series and they are still being sold at his own website,[40][41] together with "Advanced Chord Playing for Guitar by Ronny Lee" in 2 volumes that he published in 1979-80.

[45] He published the guitar method "Learn How to Play Any Song by Ear"[46] in 2011—writing the text on his computer despite having developed macular degeneration.

He died on April 22, 2015, at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, a widower since 2005 who had chosen hospice care, and was cremated at his own request.