Two people were instrumental in bringing the Society to life; Tim Hall and Lawrence Ferrara. Tim graduated from San Francisco State University with a B.A. in music in 1978 and planned to become a music teacher. Instead, he helped his father start a photo laboratory. In 1990, he decided to apply himself to the guitar again.

He called Lawrence, whom he had met in the 1970s. Lawrence invited Tim to his Monday night guitar class at City College of San Francisco. One night, as they were leaving class, Tim mentioned that someday he would like to start a guitar society in San Francisco and Lawrence agreed wholeheartedly. It would take several years, but events would eventually lead to the founding of a guitar society in San Francisco.

It was also in 1990 that Richard Leibow started a TV show called "Strategies for Success". Richard invited Tim to be on his show that year. Richard and Tim stayed in touch and one day Richard asked Tim, "Why don't you start your own TV show, just for guitar?" The year was 1996 and Tim decided to do just that. Because Tim had always wanted to start a classical guitar society, he named the show "San Francisco Classical Guitar Society". He obtained a slot on public access cable television on Monday evenings at 7:30 PM. After the show started to air, Tom Leisek, Frances Kalfus, Lawrence Ferrara and Katie Taylor all wanted to help start a "real" society where they could meet once a month and hold activities. A meeting date was set, the founders got together and the San Francisco Classical Guitar Society was formed - as a guitar organization whose mission would be to promote the awareness, understanding, and appreciation of the classical guitar.