Arianna Powell had become a versatile guitarist playing in the Pittsburgh music scene since graduating from Duquesne University. But more than 10 years ago, the Lehigh Valley native decided to move to Los Angeles, hoping to land bigger performances with bigger musical stars.
It paid off. In the last decade, the 35-year-old Powell has made a name for herself as a session guitarist, playing and touring globally.
She has been guitarist for many performers, including Nick Jonas and Dua Lipa, and has appeared on “Saturday Night Live.” She backed up hit singer Olivia Rodrigo over the summer summer at the legendary Glastonbury music festival in southwest England.
A session guitarist is a professional musician hired on a freelance basis to play guitar for recording sessions or live performances, rather than being a permanent member of a band. “Hired gun” is a slang term for it, Powell said.
Known for her versatility, sight-reading skills and ability to mesh with a musical act, Powell, a 2008 graduate of Notre Dame High School-Green Pond, where she began to study music formally, was named one of the most sensational female guitarists of all time by the trade publication Guitar Player.
She ranks among such legends as Joni Mitchell and Bonnie Raitt, according to the Guitar Player story.
Powell grew up in Plainfield Township, where her parents, Mark Powell and Sheila Borick, still live. She and her husband, Jan Ozveren, who is also a session guitarist, and their daughter, Annabel, spent their Christmas break in the Slate Belt with Powell’s family.
The self-assured Powell, who uses a nickname she coined, “Guitarianna,” was interviewed recently over a cup of coffee, with an acoustic guitar in tow (one of approximately two dozen she owns) at the Starbucks on Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. She talked about her past, her career and her future.
Her work can be seen at youtube.com/@guitarianna or instagram.com/guitarianna online.
Her answers are edited for clarity and length.
Arianna Powell speaks about her career as a musician after performing Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025, at the Starbucks along Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. Powell, who graduated in 2008 from Notre Dame High School, has toured with artists such as Nick Jonas, Olivia Rodrigo and Dua Lipa. (Amy Shortell/The Morning Call)
Arianna Powell speaks about her career as a guitarist Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025, at the Starbucks along Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. Powell, who graduated in 2008 from Notre Dame High School, has toured with artists such as Nick Jonas, Olivia Rodrigo and Dua Lipa. (Amy Shortell/The Morning Call)
Arianna Powell speaks about her career as a guitarist Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025, at the Starbucks along Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. Powell, who graduated in 2008 from Notre Dame High School, has toured with artists such as Nick Jonas, Olivia Rodrigo and Dua Lipa. (Amy Shortell/The Morning Call)
Arianna Powell speaks about her career as a musician after performing Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025, at the Starbucks along Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. Powell, who graduated in 2008 from Notre Dame High School, has toured with artists such as Nick Jonas, Olivia Rodrigo and Dua Lipa. (Amy Shortell/The Morning Call)
Arianna Powell, far right, is shown in an undated photo while pause on the summit of Mount Katahdin in Maine with her siblings and parents, Sheila Borick, left, and Mark Powell, front. (Courtesy photo)
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Arianna Powell speaks about her career as a musician after performing Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025, at the Starbucks along Sullivan Trail in Plainfield Township. Powell, who graduated in 2008 from Notre Dame High School, has toured with artists such as Nick Jonas, Olivia Rodrigo and Dua Lipa. (Amy Shortell/The Morning Call)
Q. What is it like playing guitar for the stars?
A. In some ways, it was my dream. It’s a dream come true. So, I mean, in some ways, it’s a little bit like having to pinch myself that I get to do what I love for a living, sometimes at the highest level with just some of the biggest names. I mean, it’s a bit surreal.
Q. How old was this dream? Did it start for you in high school, or before that?
A. It definitely started as a teenager. I started playing guitar when I was 12 or 13, and then I just immediately started kind of forming my own band. I played at Notre Dame several times. It was probably my first gig. I played a talent show several times, and at Notre Dame, and also I think I played at a football rally with my trio. We were called The Figs.
Q. What else do you remember about living in the Lehigh Valley, about Notre Dame, or anything else locally?
A. This is a great place to grow up. There’s a lot of love around and community, especially like the church that I grew up in [Holy Family Roman Catholic Church in Nazareth]. I just had a lot of really good friends and everyone’s just very good-natured and tight-knit. And especially living somewhere that’s so transient, it’s nice to be in a place that feels really stable.
Q. The idea of going from Pittsburgh, where you were living, to Los Angeles must have been crazy. How did you go, by plane, by car?
A. I drove. I made it a whole, like, road trip. I had a friend drive out with me and we just stopped in a bunch of cities along the way that I’d never been to. I remember we had made it to the Grand Canyon, and I still hadn’t set up a place in L.A. to live yet, couldn’t find, like, an apartment, and eventually found this room on Craigslist. The friend left. I just stayed.
Q. Do you look at yourself as an influencer, particularly for girls who might want emulate your career?
A. I hope that I’m an influencer in the sense that when you love something so much, and you want to do something so much, that you absolutely should try to pursue it and go for it. So I hope in that way that I’m influencing people. As a guitar player, the same thing: I hope I’m influencing people in ways that I’m playing, but again, more than anything, just like being an example going after what you want and also just being true to yourself, too. Because I feel like I really try to do that in my own playing. I just try to be as authentic to myself as a musician, because in that way, no one can compete with you being just you, if you’re really authentically yourself. So in that way, I hope that other people are inspired by that for themselves.
Q. What are your plans for 2026?
A. If Olivia [Rodrigo] starts up again, I’ll be out with her, but I want to work mostly on my own music. I formed a trio in Los Angeles, where I’m going to hope to perform. I want to focus on my own projects. I also do a lot of teaching. I teach for an online academy [Sonora Guitar Intensive]. It has really incredible players that teach here. They’re working on becoming an accredited, online university. Sometimes I run my own live classes.
Contact Morning Call reporter Anthony Salamone at asalamone@mcall.com.