Ian Guest was born in 1940, Hungary and immigrated to Brazil in 1957.

Bachelor in Composition by the Rio de Janeiro Federal University and Berklee College of Music, Boston (magna cum laude)

He funded, in 1987, Centro Ian Guest de Aperfeiçoamento Musical-CIGAM, Rio de Janeiro, one of the first Brazilian schools engaged in "popular music" methodology, specialized in bossa nova and new currentsof Brazilian idioms; now it comprises 30 classes, 20 teachers and 300 students.

He delivers workshops, intensive and extensive courses on composition, arranging, harmony, modalism and Kodály method ear training, as well as lectures on methodology and music education in Rio de Janeiro, Brasília, São Paulo, Curitiba, Belo Horizonte, Fortaleza and other main Brazilian cities, at universities, art fundations and festivals; some of the most prominent Brazilian instrument performers, arrangers and educators are among his disciples.

He introduced Kodály’s "Movable do system" solfeggio in some of the main Brazilian cities.

He published in 1996 Arranging, a practical method in 3 volumes and in 2000 16 studies for piano, both CD illustrated, by Brazil’s nº1 music publisher Almir Chediak. Now his harmony, a practical method is under production, by the same publisher.

He wrote music and arrangementes, and directed commercial records, movie and theatre tracks, jingles and spots – most of them produced by first line Brazilian and multi-national companies.