Carl Angelo
has performed as a soloist and collaborative musician on piano and organ throughout the United States. He has lectured and performed for the American Matthay Association for Piano, co-edited with Marie Hasse materials based upon the ideas of Matthay pupil Helen Parker Ford, and conducted clinics for the American Guild of Organists. He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Indiana University where he studied with Larry Smith. He was the winner of the 1987 American Guild of Organists Young Artist Competition, Indianapolis, Indiana, and is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda National Music Honorary Society. He holds Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees from Kent State University where he studied organ with John D. Herr and John Ferguson, and piano with Robert Palmieri. Extensive piano study was with Nellie Whittaker, a pupil of Guy Maier, and coaching with Gary Wolf, professor emeritus of the University of Central Florida.
Presently, Dr. Angelo is the organist at First Presbyterian Church of Flint, Michigan, Artist in Piano and Organ at Saginaw Valley State University, and pianist for the Saginaw Choral Society. He has most recently served as music director/organist at First Congregational Church, Saginaw, Michigan (1999-2010), and First Presbyterian Church, Winter Haven, Florida (1990-1999), establishing popular concert series in both communities.
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Richard Becker
is head
of piano studies at the University of Richmond. He is active as a recitalist, composer, chamber musician, and poet,
and his playing has been acclaimed in Europe and America. Performing on many college campuses over the years, and frequently touring the eastern United States, he has also performed at venues such as Alice Tully Hall, the National Gallery of Art, the French Embassy, the Library of Congress, and at the Hudson River, Kemper, Virginia, and Spencer Museums. He has performed at the Salle Cortot and Salle Michelet in Paris where he has six times been artist-in-residence at Cité Internationale des Arts.
Richard Becker’s music has been commissioned by Meet the Composer Grants, by grants from CRS Records, by the Peabody Trio in conjunction with the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, and he has been a MacDowell Colony Fellow and nominee for an American Academy of Arts and Letters award. His performances and his music have been heard on NPR, Voice of America, WNYC, WETA, WGMS, and WCVE, and at the American Music Festival of the National Gallery of Art. They have also been featured at CMS and MTNA conferences and during residencies at Marshall, James Madison, Eastern Mennonite Universities,the Longy School of Music and the Peabody and New England Conservatories and at the Eastman School of Music. He coached chamber music alongside the late Blanche Moyse and he performed and coached chamber music with members of the Shanghai Quartet during their the decade of an artist-residency at University of Richmond.
Richard Becker’s playing has been cited for its “powerful interpretations” by the Washington Post, for being “admirable in taste and technique” by the New York Times, and for being “brilliant and with seamless passagework and elegant phrasing” by the Richmond Times-Dispatch. His playing is grounded in the tradition of Arthur Schnabel acquired during his study with the late Leonard Shure while at Boston University (M. Mus.). His teaching owes much to the relaxation methods of Tobias Matthay, learned from Cécile Staub Genhart during his years at the Eastman School of Music (B.Mus. and Performers Certificate). He taught at the University of Texas and Boston University prior to joining the music faculty of the University of Richmond in 1975.
In recent years, Richard Becker’s poetry has been published by America, Columbia Magazine, Visions-International, Cold Mountain and Poetica Magazine: Contemporary Jewish Writing and Art and his poetic sequence, “FATES,” was a 2008 chapbook of The Literary Review. Hiscompositions have been recorded by CRS and his performances are available on Albany Records.
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Nigel Coxe
is a Jamaican-born, British-trained pianist
living in the U. S. A Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in
London, where he studied with Harold Craxton, he has also served as a professor at the Academy.
He is currently professor of music at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and he combines
his teaching with an active schedule of recitals and lecturing. He has performed
widely in Europe, Great Britain, and America. He has appeared as soloist with the London Philharmonic,
the London Symphony, the Hallé Orchestra, and many others. He has also given recitals for the
Australian Broadcasting Commission in Sydney and has made numerous solo and concerto
appearances for the BBC London. The New York Times has written, "He goes to the heart of
his music in modestly straightforward fashion, leading from expressive strength and shunning any
sort of virtuoso exaggerations." The Times (London) has called him "a musician's pianist to the core."
Mr. Coxe has made two very well-received CDs, both available on the Titanic label:
Music of Percy Grainger and Showstoppers, a disc featuring the music of Gershwin, Grainger, and
Eubie Blake. Both have received worldwide critical acclaim. Recently he was also a member of the
International Jury for the Concours de Musique du Canada in Montreal.
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Nancy Hill Elton
began her musical studies with piano lessons from her mother. She holds the Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in both piano and vocal performance from the University of Texas. She earned her undergraduate degree at the University of South Carolina where she was the recipient of numerous awards and scholarships, including the school’s highest honor, the Music Achievement Award. There she studied piano with John Kenneth Adams and voice with Evelyn McGarrity. At the University of Texas, she studied piano with John Perry and voice with Glenda Maurice and Bethany Beardslee. Additional piano study was with Frank Mannheimer for three summers in Duluth, Minnesota. She also attended the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California, where she studied piano with Jerome Lowenthal and accompanying and chamber music with Gwendolyn Koldolfsky.
A versatile performer, Nancy has fashioned a dual career in piano and in voice. She has received critical acclaim as a piano concerto soloist and as solo recitalist, and has performed throughout the South and many other areas of the US. She has an extensive solo repertoire, but has also performed as a collaborative artist with many instrumentalists and singers over the years. Concerto performances have included Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto and Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganni, Grieg's Piano Concerto, and Beethoven's Choral Fantasy for the Musica Sacra Concert Series at First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta and again recently with the Buckhead Youth Orchestra. Nancy’s past presentations for the Matthay Festival have included solo recitals at Kennesaw State University and at the University of Kansas, and lecture recitals on Schumann’s Carnaval, and the Elliot Carter Piano Sonata.
A lyric soprano, Nancy has sung many leading operatic roles as well as art song recitals, and has accumulated an extensive oratorio repertoire. While she lived in Texas, she was sought by local composers for her pure tone and perfect pitch. She sang several premiers of songs by Kathryn Mischell and Priscilla Mclean. She is soprano soloist on a CD entitled Songs for Adults and Other Children (Capstone Records) by Priscilla McLean. A highlight of her vocal study was the honor of being selected through national taped auditions to study with famed soprano Elizabeth Schwarzkopf and Walter Legge in a German Lieder Summer Workshop in Thunder Bay, Canada. She was also soprano soloist with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra for a Youth Concert, singing the famous aria “Una voce poco fa” under the direction of William Fred Scot. Nancy sang as soprano soloist with the Musica Sacra Concert Series of Atlanta for 12 years, She sang the leading role in Bizet’s youthful opera, Dr. Miracle, for an entire season with the Atlanta Opera Outreach Program throughout the city schools of Atlanta. Her most recent performances have included singing Liszt’s Three Songs from William Tell at the American Liszt Society Conference last year at the University of Oregon. Nancy has also branched out into singing the great standard jazz songs of the early twentieth century in retirement homes and other venues. She will present next fall at the GMTA conference with Georgia’s jazz pianist legend, Geoffrey Haydn of Georgia State University, singing songs of Gershwin, Kern, Carmichael, Arlen and many others.
In addition to her large private studio, Nancy has held teaching positions at Georgia State University, Clayton State College and the University of West Georgia. She was recently invited to join the piano faculty of the University of Georgia where she teaches applied piano primarily to piano majors. Nancy is active as an adjudicator and clinician for many piano festivals and professional organizations throughout the Southeast and is Past-President of Atlanta Music Teachers Association. In 2005 she received the Georgia Music Teachers Association Teacher of the Year Award.
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Victoria Fischer Faw
received her musical education at Centenary College of Louisiana with teachers Constance Knox Carroll and
Donald Rupert, the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill (musicology), the University of Texas at Austin (Danielle Martin and David Renner), and the Vienna Conservatory in Austria as a Rotary
Foundation Fellow. In addition to performing and teaching a varied repertoire of the standard keyboard literature, she specializes in the music of Béla Bartók.
A first-prize winner of the Bartók-Kabalevsky International Piano Competition, and recipient of the Regional Artist Award of the National Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi,
she is in demand as a performer, scholar and teacher. She is the author of a number of publications, including Bartók Perspectives (Oxford University Press), edited with
Elliott Antokoletz and Benjamin Suchoff, a chapter contributed to A Bartók Companion (Cambridge University Press) and an article in the International Journal of Musicology.
Her recordings include a solo CD of Bartók works entitled Evening in the Country. She is celebrating her thirtieth year on the music faculty at Elon University in Elon, North Carolina, where she teaches
piano, piano pedagogy, chamber music, and mentors undergraduate research. She is active in MTNA and NCMTA, which was recognized as MTNA State Affiliate of the Year under her leadership
in 2020. When not at Elon, she lives with her husband, Stephen Faw, in the mountains of North Carolina.
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George Fee
received his doctorate in piano performance from Indiana University. Having begun his collegiate study at the Eastman School of Music, he earned his bachelor's degree from the Oberlin College Conservatory and his master's degree from the University of Wisconsin. His teachers at these schools were Menahem Pressler, Cecile Genhart, Jack Radunsky, and Howard Karp. Pre-college and summer study was with Willis Bennett, Rosina Lhévinne, Frank Mannheimer, and Aiko Onishi. He later coached with Igor Kipnis and Freda Rosenblatt. His two-volume doctoral dissertation, The Solo Keyboard Sonatas and Sonatinas of Georg Anton Benda, is a major resource in the field of eighteenth-century music. Dr. Fee has performed numerous solo recitals throughout the country, as well as appearing as soloist with orchestra and collaborator. Married to Dr. Susan Dersnah Fee, theorist, pianist, and violinist, they opened the Dersnah-Fee School of Music in Midland, Michigan, in 1979. In 1999, they moved their studio to San Diego, California, and in 2016 they returned to Midland to resume teaching there. They have presented many master classes, lectures, and workshops in different parts of the country. Their website is www.dersnah-fee.com
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Wendy Freeland
joined the music faculty of Jacksonville State University in
Jacksonville, Alabama, in 2002. As an associate professor she teaches
studio piano, class piano, music history and accompanying. Hailing from
West Virginia, she completed her Master of Music and Doctor of Musical
Arts degrees in piano performance at the University of South Carolina
under the tutelage of John Kenneth Adams.
Her Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance was received from
Florida Atlantic University where she studied with Heather Coltman and
Judith Burganger, and she was the first music student to complete both
the academic and performance honors programs. She is the recipient of
several performance and scholarship awards and was named University
Scholar by the University.
She enjoys performing as soloist and collaborative artist. She has
performed for both the Alabama Music Teachers State Conference and the
Alabama Music Educators National Conference, as well as at universities
and other venues throughout the country. She was honored to accept an
invitation to present and perform at the World Piano Conference in Novi
Sad, Serbia in June, 2011, and has performed in Sweden, Italy, and
Korea. Dr. Freeland has performed with instrumentalists, vocalists and
choral groups, and has extensive experience working in opera. She is a
regular performer of faculty, guest and student recitals at Jacksonville
State University.
Understanding music of the twentieth century through a cultural context
has been Dr. Freeland’s research interest. Her doctoral dissertation,
entitled "An Examination of the Promenades for Piano by Francis
Poulenc" revealed the influences that shaped this composition. Her
desire for the public to understand piano music by considering aspects
of art and society led to her presentations of Poulenc's Promenades and Alberto Ginastera's Danzas Argentinas
for the University of South Carolina's Cultural Enrichment Day.
Jacksonville State University has granted her the annual "Faculty
Research Award" several times in recognition of her performances and
presentations. Her broad perspective of the function of music and love
for sharing it makes her an attentive and enthusiastic teacher who has
worked with students in West Virginia, Florida, South Carolina and
Alabama.
In addition to performing and teaching, Dr. Freeland is active in other
musical pursuits. She actively adjudicates piano competitions and
auditions, and enjoys giving masterclasses and presentations, such as
“Technique: A Sound Approach,” given to such groups as the Atlanta Music
Teachers Association. Dr. Freeland organizes the annual Foothills
Piano Festival on the campus of JSU, coordinates the JSU Music
Department's Music Preparatory Program, and is President of the Alabama
Music Teachers Association. She is a member of Phi Kappa Lambda, Sigma
Alpha Iota, and the Music Teachers National Association.
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Stewart Gordon
has had a distinguished career as a pianist, teacher, writer, editor, composer, and impresario. He currently holds the position of Professor of Keyboard Studies at the Thornton School of Music of the University of Southern California in Los Angles. As a performing pianist, he has played concerts throughout the world and recorded extensively (including the complete Preludes of Rachmaninoff), both to critical acclaim. As a teacher and author he has produced textbooks, essays, videotapes, and editions. As a composer, his musical theater works have been produced from coast to coast, and as an impresario, he has directed music festivals and competitions over the past decades in New York, Washington, and Savannah.
Born to the distinguished poet and novelist Guanetta Gordon and a career military officer Lynell Frank Gordon, Stewart Gordon grew up in many parts of the world, locations where his father served in the United States Army. Thus he was able to receive music instruction from a number of different teachers, some of them very famous: Olga Samaroff, Walter Gieseking, Cécile Genhart, and Adele Marcus.
After serving as a junior officer in the United States Navy for three years, he began his academic career at Wilmington College in Ohio. He then taught for more than two decades at the University of Maryland in College Park, where for six years he was chair of the Department of Music. It was at the University of Maryland that he created the international piano competition now known as the William Kapell and acted as its director for thirteen years.
He then served as Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs of Queens College of the City University of New York. For Queens College he created and directed the New York area-wide Cultural Heritage Competitions, as well as the Great Gospel Competitions.
Since 1988 he has served at his present academic post at the University of Southern California. At the same time he began to work with the Savannah, Georgia, community to create an annual music festival and competition. The Savannah Onstage Music Festival and the American Traditions Competition resulted, and he continued to act as artistic director for both events until 2002. Dr. Gordon
has authored many books, including A History of Keyboard Literature (Schirmer, 1996)—considered by most to be the standard work in the field—Mastering the Art of Performance (Oxford, 2006), and Beethoven's 32 Piano Sonatas (Oxford, 2017). As an editor, he has completed a new critical edition of the 32 Piano Sonatas of Beethoven (Alfred) in four volumes (2002, 2004, 2008 and 2010), as well as the Debussy Etudes (2015). He is currently engaged in a critical edition of the Mozart piano sonatas, scheduled for release soon.
Today he makes his home in Southern California on a hill in Rancho Palos Verdes overlooking the Pacific Ocean and Catalina Island. Stewart Gordon's web site is http://stewartgordon.com.
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Donald Hageman
has taught privately
and performed in the Dayton, Ohio, area for more than fifty years. He studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music,
the University of Dayton, and the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati. His piano
studies were with Ada Clyde Gallagher, Beryl Rubinstein, Frances Bolton Kortheuer, and Madeline Bostian Rider,
a pupil of Tobias Matthay. He served as a member of the piano faculty at Wright State University from 1976-83,
and for seventeen years was Director of Concerts for the Dayton Art Institute. He is also the Founder/Director of
the Soirées Musicales International Piano Series, which recently
completed its fortieth (and final) season. He is a past President and
presently, Archivist, of the American Matthay Association, and since 1963, has appeared every year but two as a
recitalist and/or lecturer at the annual Matthay Festivals held throughout the United States and in Canada. In
2004 he was awarded the organization's First Annual Distinguished Service Award. In 1999 he appeared as soloist
with Dayton's Miami Valley Symphony Orchestra in performances of the Tchaikovsky G Major Concerto, and
subsequently in performances of the Mozart Concerto, K. 467, and Chopin's Andante Spianato and Grande Polonaise
Brilliante. He also performed the Dohnanyi Variations on a Nursery Theme and Liszt's Totentanz,
playing a 1913 Erard
Concert Grand which he has restored.
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Christopher Harding
maintains a flourishing international performancecareer, generating acclaim and impressing audiences and critics alike with his substantive interpretations and pianistic mastery. He has given frequent solo, concerto, and chamber music performances in venues as far flung as the Kennedy Center and Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., Suntory Hall in Tokyo and the National Theater Concert Hall in Taipei, the Jack Singer Concert Hall in Calgary, and halls and festival appearances in Newfoundland, Israel, Romania, and China. His concerto performances have included concerts with the National Symphony and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestras, the San Angelo and Santa Barbara Symphonies, and the Tokyo City Philharmonic, working with such conductors as Andrew Sewell, Eric Zhou, TaijiroIimori, Gisele Ben-Dor, Fabio Machetti, Randall Craig Fleisher, John DeMain, Ron Spiegelman, Daniel Alcott, and Darryl One, among others. His chamber music and duo collaborations have included internationally renowned artists such as clarinetist Karl Leister, flautist Andras Adorjan, and members of the St. Lawrence and Ying String Quartets, in addition to frequent projects with his distinguished faculty colleagues at the University of Michigan. He has recorded solo and chamber music CDs for the Equilibrium and Brevard Classics labels. He has additionally edited and published critical editions and recordings of works by Claude Debussy (Children’s Corner, Arabesques and shorter works) and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Viennese Sonatinas) for the Schirmer Performance Editions published by Hal Leonard.
Professor Harding is Chair of Piano and Associate Professor of Piano Performance and Chamber Music at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance. He has presented master classes and lecture recitals in universities across the United States and Asia, as well as in Israel and Canada. His most recent tours to Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China included presentations and master classes at Hong Kong Baptist University, National Taiwan Normal University, Soo Chow University, the National Taiwan University of Education, and conservatories and universities in Beijing (Central and China Conservatories), Tianjin, Shanghai, Hefei, Guangzhou, Shenyang, Dalien, and Chongqing. He has additionally performed and lectured numerous times in Seoul, including lecture recitals and classes at Seoul National University, Ewha Women’s University, and Dong Duk University. He has served extended tours as a Fulbright Senior Specialist at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music in Chengdu, China (2008), and also at Seoul National University (2011). While teaching at SNU, he simultaneously held a Special Chair in Piano at Ewha Womens’ University.
In addition to teaching undergraduate and graduate piano performance and chamber music at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance, Mr. Harding also serves on the faculty of the Indiana University Summer Piano Academy and is a frequent guest artist and teacher at the MasterWorks Festival in Winona Lake, IN. recent summer festivals have also included the Chautauqua Institution in New York, and the Rebecca Penneys Piano Festival in Tampa, Florida.
Mr. Harding was born of American parents in Munich, Germany and raised in Northern Virginia. His collegiate studies were with MenahemPressler and Nelita True. Prior to college, he worked for ten years with Milton Kidd at the American University Department of Performing Arts Preparatory Division, where he was trained in the traditions of Tobias Matthay. He has taken twenty-five first prizes in national and international competitions and in 1999 was awarded the special "Mozart Prize" at the Cleveland International Piano Competition, given for the best performance of a composition by Mozart. His current recording projects include the Brahms viola/clarinet sonatas and the clarinet trio, with clarinetist Dan Gilbert, violist Stephen Boe, and cellist Yeonjin Kim.
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Marie Hasse
holds a Bachelor of Arts in Piano Performance from the
University
of Central Florida, where she studied with Gary Wolf. She is Head of Keyboard Studies at Polk
Community College and she also teaches privately in the Winter Haven Area. She is currently the
President of the Bach Festival of Central Florida, a past president of the Florida State Music
Teachers Association, and
she frequently adjudicates for FSMTA student events. As Southeastern Regional Junior Festivals
Chairman, she is also active in the student events of the Florida Federation of Music Clubs. Ms.
Hasse is presently serving as Secretary for the American Matthay Association for
the second time and has frequently lectured at the AMA's annual festivals. She performs in
chamber music recitals in the area and lectures on piano pedagogy. In recent years, she has
worked extensively to publicize the contributions of Helen Parker Ford, a Matthay pupil who
specialized in teaching his principles to younger children. Ms. Hasse is also the organist for
First Presbyterian Church in Haines City.
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Mary Pendleton Hoffer
is currently the President of the American Matthay Association for Piano. She has performed as soloist, chamber musician, orchestral keyboardist, and accompanist in the United States, Mexico, and England. She made her London solo debut at the prestigious Wigmore Hall in 1984, and she has appeared as a soloist with the Phoenix Symphony, and the Amarillo and Lubbock Symphonies. For many years she served as Keyboardist for the Phoenix Symphony Orchestra and Principal Keyboardist for the Sun Cities Symphony. She has also served as Keyboardist for The Florida Orchestra in Tampa. She is a member of many chamber ensembles, including the Bel Canto Players, and frequently performs with singers. Her summer festival appearances include the Sedona Chamber Music Festival, the New Hampshire Music Festival, and the Park City International Chamber Music Festival. She began to play the piano before she was three years old, studying with her father, Samuel Pendleton, a student of Tobias Matthay. At the age of five, she was the youngest performer ever to participate in the Berkeley (California) Bach Festival, and she later was a prize winner in the Chicago Young Artists Competition. She graduated as Salutatorian from Interlochen Arts Academy, and completed Bachelor and Master of Music degrees at Texas Tech University. She studied in England with Denise Lassimonne, Martino Tirimo and Gwenneth Pryor, completing graduate diplomas at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Academy of Music. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Arizona State University. She has taught at Texas Tech University, Arizona State University, and in the Maricopa County (AZ) Community Colleges. For many years she collaborated with her late husband, Warren Hoffer, a tenor and professor of voice at ASU, and their joint performances of major works such as Schubert's Winterreise were highly acclaimed throughout the nation.
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Ann Holler
currently fills several roles, as composer, independent piano teacher, adjunct faculty member at King University in Bristol, Tennessee, and arts volunteer. Ann has earned a B. A. in Mathematics from King College and a B. A. in Music (Piano Performance) from Virginia Intermont College in Bristol, Virginia, where she studied with Kenneth Huber. She also holds an M. M. in Music Theory from the University of Tennessee. In her own compositions she draws upon her previous studies in piano, voice, organ, theory, and mathematics to create new music. Her music has been performed across the U. S. as well as in England, Scotland, and Italy. In 2011 GIA Publications released her hymn tune HOLSTON in a collection entitled “Assembled for Song.” ALRY Publications has published her “Tranquility” in two arrangements, one for flute and piano, and the other for flute ensemble. She has written for the American Music Teacher and the Tennessee Music Teacher and is the co-author of the Tennessee Music Teachers Association Written Theory Tests, used throughout the state of Tennessee.
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Kenneth Huber
is a member of the piano faculty of Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota,
having been appointed in 1990. He received his Bachelor of Music Degree from Indiana
University in 1967, and completed his Master of Music Degree with Honors in 1972. His study of the piano began at age four
with his aunt, and continued with Shirley Shaffer of the Matthay School. While at Indiana University, he studied with Gyorgy
Sebok and spent summers in Duluth, Minnesota, studying with the late Frank Mannheimer.
From 1969 to 1973, he studied
privately with internationally-known pianist and conductor Leon Fleisher
of the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore.
Mr. Huber has concertized extensively throughout the United States since
making his solo debut at age fourteen in Colorado
Springs. He appears frequently on radio and television, including a
widely-broadcast video tape for the University of North
Carolina Public Television; a live radio broadcast on WQXR, New York
City; and on Minnesota Public Radio including its prestigious "Live from
Landmark" series. His performances have taken him to hundreds of
cities in over thirty-five states including engagements at the
Indianapolis, Toledo, and Minneapolis Museums of Art, the Bakken
Library, the Walker Art Center, and Steinway Hall. In addition he has
been heard frequently as soloist with regional orchestras, including the
Colorado Philharmonic; the Gulf Coast Symphony; the Fairbanks, Alaska,
Symphony; the Chattanooga Symphony; the Lake Superior Chamber Orchestra;
and the Richmond Sinfonia. He has also appeared in recital as
accompanist for many leading singers, including opera stars of the
Metropolitan, New York City, Vienna, and La Scala Operas.
In 1968 Mr. Huber began a four-year tour of duty as concert pianist with
the United States Navy Band in Washington, DC.
In addition to numerous appearances with the Concert Band, he played
over 350 engagements as accompanist for the Sea
Chanters, the official Navy Chorus, appearing at the White House, the
State Department, and for world dignitaries and government officials
throughout the United States.
Mr. Huber currently resides in New York City and Minneapolis, where he
teaches privately in addition to his college
teaching appointments. He has been actively involved in music education
since 1960 maintaining his own private studios,
college teaching positions, and appearing as guest lecturer and master
teacher for colleges, universities, and professional
organizations. He counts among his former students many scholarship and
prize winners who are actively pursuing
musical careers as distinguished performers, teachers, and church
musicians. He is sought out by professional and
amateur performing pianists alike who continue to study well beyond
their conservatory training.
During the 1989-90 academic year, Mr. Huber commuted to Princeton, New
Jersey, where he served as Adjunct
Professor of Piano at Westminster Choir College. From 1974-1987 he was
tenured Professor of Piano at Virginia
Intermont College in Bristol, Virginia, and was Founder and Director of
Celebrity Concerts, a series which presented
an extensive array of internationally-acclaimed artists. He also served
ten years on the piano faculty of Augsburg
College in Minneapolis. In 1987 he was Artist-in-Residence for the
theater department at Gardner-Webb College.
During the summers he has presented lectures and recitals at both the
American Matthay Association Festivals and
the Mannheimer Piano Festivals, for which he was Artistic Director. He
is often asked to adjudicate for national
scholarship competitions and auditions, including the MTNA, the San
Antonio International Keyboard Competition,
the Miss Kentucky Pageant, and St. Paul's Schubert Club. He is an active
member of several professional musical
organizations and has served two terms as panelist for the Virginia
Commission for the Arts.
During the 1977-78 season, Mr. Huber's recitals featured the United
States premiere of the Piano Sonata
by Kenton Coe, distinguished American composer, including a performance
at the National Gallery of Art in
Washington, DC. The following season included the West Coast premiere of
that work in a San Francisco debut recital
at the Old First Center for the Performing Arts. In 1981 he made his
Carnegie Recital Hall (now Weill Recital Hall)
debut with cellist Paul Lawrence in New York City.
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Milton Kidd
is a past Treasurer of the American Matthay Association. He holds the rank
of Adjunct Associate Professor Emeritus from The American University in
Washington, D.C., where he was a member of the piano faculty for
thirty-one years. Ten of those years were in combination with his post
as Director of A.U.'s Preparatory Music Division. In 1981 he was the
recipient of the College of Arts and Sciences, as well as the
University-wide, Adjunct Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching. His
principal piano studies were with Charles Crowder and the late Evelyn
Swarthout (a student of Tobias Matthay). He has been a frequent
performer in the Washington area as well as the presenter of numerous
lectures on piano technique and pedagogy in this country and Canada, and
has lectured at AMA festivals in Toronto, Pittsburgh, San Jose and
Springfield. With Evelyn Swarthout, he performed the Canadian premiere
of the Sonata for Two Pianos by Esther Williamson Ballou. Mr. Kidd's
students have been prize winners in many D.C. area and national
competitions, including the International Stravinsky Awards,
Washington's National Symphony Young Soloists' Competition and the Clara
Wells Auditions. Of late he maintains a private studio in Maine and
teaches at the University of Maine Farmington. A forty-four-year member
and supporter of the American Matthay Association, he has been a member
of the Board and was for seventeen years Chairman of the Clara Wells
Piano Scholarship Auditions.
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Arjola Miruku
is a Nationally Certified Music Teacher and holds a Master of Music degree in Piano Pedagogy from Texas Christian University where she received a Graduate Assistantship. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Rollins College earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in Piano Performance on a full scholarship studying with Artist-in-Residence Dr. Gary Wolf. Under his tutelage, Ms. Miruku won the Orlando Music Club Piano Competition consecutively for two years, performed as a soloist with the Rollins College Orchestra, and was featured at The Boheme Bösendorfer Lounge Kessler Signature Young Artist Series. At Rollins, she was a chapter founding member and served as President of Sigma Alpha Iota International Music Fraternity for Women where she was awarded the Sword of Honor and the Collegiate Honor Award for Musicianship, Scholarship, and Leadership.
Her other musical interests led to a semester study in London interning with St. Martin-in-the-Fields, concentrating on the classical music business. In London, she continued her piano studies at the Royal Academy of Music. In addition, she created and hosted a weekly program titled PianoForte on WPRK- 91.5 FM Radio and was the score reader for the live webcast of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.
Ms. Miruku is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda and MTNA, having served as President of the TCU Collegiate Chapter and presented at the national conference. Also a member of TMTA and FWMTA, she is a frequent adjudicator at many local festivals, contests and Texas state conventions. She has presented lecture recitals on the technical and teaching principles of Matthay at the TMTA state conferences, the American Matthay Association for Piano Festival, and local teachers' associations. Based on her research, she was awarded the SAI Professional Development Grant and also published an article on this topic in the American Music Teacher. Alongside her positions as Instructor in Musicology and Class Piano and Preparatory Division faculty at Texas Christian University, Ms. Miruku is an adjunct Professor of Piano at Texas Wesleyan University and has her own private studio.
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Barton Moreau
made his solo debut in a New York City performance with the New England Youth Ensemble at the age of 15. He has since performed as a featured soloist with orchestras across the United States, including the Northwest Florida Symphony, New Orleans Symphony, Port City Symphony (Mobile, AL), Mesa Symphony (Arizona), Gulf Coast Symphony, and the Boise Baroque Orchestra.
Moreau’s honors include a top prize at the Debose National Piano Competition and a collegiate artist award from the Alabama Music Teachers Association. In 2007, he was a finalist at the World Piano Pedagogy Conference’s PIANOvision Most Wanted Piano Competition, an international online competition created by Benjamin Saver.
As a collaborative artist, Moreau has performed with a diverse array of distinguished international players, including clarinetists Robert Spring and Jorge Montilla, oboists Andrea Ridilla and Gonzalo Ruiz, violinist Rachel Barton Pine, and composer-violinist Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR). He has appeared at national and international conferences, including those of the College Music Society, International Double Reed Society (IDRS), and the International Clarinet Association (ICA), most recently at ClarinetFest 2018. Other performances include appearances with the Boise Philharmonic Orchestra, and at the McCall Second Sunday Sounds Concert Series (Idaho). Moreau joined the Boise Baroque Orchestra as principal keyboardist in 2012 and regularly appears on their subscription series.
Moreau holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Arizona State University, and a Master of Music degree in piano performance from Indiana University. His collegiate career began at the University of South Alabama, where he was a recipient of the Theodore Presser Award. Moreau’s major teachers were Robert Hamilton, Karen Shaw, and Jerry Bush. He has also coached with Lee Luvisi, Fabio Bidini, Mykola Suk, and Leonard Hokanson.
Moreau serves as a Lecturer of Music at Boise State, teaching courses in piano, music theory, and music history. In addition to his collegiate teaching and performance activities, he is also an active studio teacher and adjudicator and an Associate Member of the American Matthay Association for Piano.
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John O'Brien
is Professor
of Accompanying at East Carolina University. He has studied with John Perry, Gwendolyn Koldofsky, and Jean Barr.
He has also studied harpsichord with Malcolm Hamilton, Elaine Funaro, and Arthur Hasshas. He has
collaborated with such artists as
Metropolitan Opera stars Hilda Harris and Victoria Livengood, violinist Eliot Chapo, tenor Bill Brown, flautist
Carol Wincenc (The Juilliard School), and clarinetist Deborah Chodacki (University of Michigan). He has performed in New
York's Merkin Recital Hall, at the Istanbul Festival with cellist Selma Gokcen, and his guest appearances include recitals
and masterclasses at the Interlochen Arts Academy, Florida State University, Columbus State University, and the
Southeastern Music Festival. He is active as both a pianist and harpsichordist and performs regularly with the Clarino
Consort and Baroque dance soloist Paige Whitley-Bauguess. He was a featured artist at the 2005 and 2006 Magnolia
Baroque Festival in Winston-Salem. Dr. O'Brien has also performed twice at the Piccolo Spoleto Festival with
the Chatham Baroque. He holds a DMA from the University of Southern California.
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Nancy Perrin
received her Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from the Ohio State University where she studied with Miriam Mooney, herself a student of Tobias Matthay. At Ohio State,
Nancy also minored in Vocal Performance. At Wright State University, Nancy earned a Master of Music with a concentration in piano. There, she studied with Donald Hageman. with
whom she continued to study for a few more years post-graduation. In addition to traditional piano study, Nancy has also focused on jazz piano studies. She is a past lecturer-performer
at the Matthay festivals. She has won the WSU Concerto Competition and performed Gershwin's Concerto in F with the WSU Symphony Orchestra. Nancy concertizes in the southern Ohio
area including appearances at the Dayton Art Institute, Dayton Music Club events, and Sinclair Community College. Partnering with Jim Lees, Nancy and Jim performed at the Art
Institute, playing Bartok's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion, performed outdoors and complete with a helicopter flying overhead mid-performance! She is a silver medal winner
from the American College of Musicians/National Guild of Piano Teachers for her performance of Alberto Ginastera's Piano Sonata No. 1, Op. 22. She is on the music faculty at
Sinclair College in Dayton, where she teaches piano and music courses, and is a pianist for the vocal music and theatre departments. In addition, Nancy is very active as a
professional pianist at Wright State University in Dayton, working in the music department and music theatre division. Other activities include serving as pianist and musical
director for many musical theatre productions in the Dayton area. Nancy lives near Dayton in Centerville, Ohio.
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Jacqueline Privette Pope
is a native of South Carolina, and received her Bachelor of
Arts with a major in music education from Furman University in
Greenville. She later studied voice with Audrey Nasserman at
the University of Louisville. She spent a 10-month
period in Ruschlikon, Switzerland (Zurich Canton) at the Baptist
International Seminary, with her then husband, Wallace Kilpatrick,
and studied theology for 2 semesters as was required of wives. The
international experience shaped a lot of Jacqueline's thoughts
afterwards. When she returned to
Louisville she taught junior high school music for a year before
going to Atlanta, where she studied voice with Irene Harrower
for 2 years. Jackie received a Master of Music with emphasis on
voice peformance from Georgia State Uiversity in 1987, studying
voice with Peter Harrower, a bass soloist of some
renown. She also studied in London with Meribeth Bunch in
conjunction with her Master's study, learning more about the anatomy
of the voice, and she also pursued some studies at the Royal Academy of Medicine. She studied piano with Powell Everhart in Atlanta for 3 years
and with Joseph Meeks of Kennesaw State University. For 10 years she taught in
the Cobb County Public Schools as Music Specialist, and for
several years she was the music director of Cobb Children's Theater.
She has served the Nativity Lutheran Church since 1971, where she
served as organist, pianist, Music Director, and Chancel Choir
Director, at various times. She served as Director of Music for 9 years
at Southminster Presbyterian Church, where she established their
first hand-bell program, as well as directing chancel choir and
children's choirs. Jackie is nationally certified by the National
Music Teachers Association as a voice performer and teacher of voice.
and by the Georgia Music Teachers Association as a certified piano teacher. She is also a
member of MTNA. Jackie maintains
a voice and piano studio in Austell, Georgia, where she and her husband,
James, now live. She often presents lecture recitals on various topics for area music teachers and is in demand for judging auditions and competitions.
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James Pope
started studying the guitar at the age of 11 and had developed
an equal temperament tuning system for the instrument by the age of 15, which he later
used in greater depth in his piano tuning. His piano teachers include Paul Orlene, Harry Persse, and Regina Pudney of Juilliard. He was also a close friend of Powell Everhart—a student of Isidor Philipp—for whom he tuned and with whom he studied for the last ten years of Everhart's life.
One of the most respected tuners and technicians in the greater Atlanta area, James in now in his fiftieth year
of tuning and rebuilding pianos. His web site is
http://www.popepianoservice.com/.
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Janice Larson Razaq
is the current Vice-President of the American Matthay Association for Piano. She has a doctorate from Texas Tech University and additional degrees from the Eastman School of Music and the University of Illinois. Her Matthay-trained teachers include Frank Mannheimer and
Cécile Genhart. A Fulbright scholar in England, she performed at Wigmore Hall in London, where she received excellent reviews. She was an award winner in the Maria Canals International Competition in Barcelona. Dr. Razaq is heard on WFMT and Minnesota Public Radio and plays concertos with regional orchestras. Solo performances range across the country. Her upcoming performances/presentations for the summer of 2013 include an appearance at the Canadian Federation of Music Teachers Association National Conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Dr. Razaq is active in the Illinois State Music Teachers Association, where she has been Certification Chair, and is currently State President. She is Director of Keyboard Studies at William Rainey Harper College in Palatine where she teaches applied piano, non-credit piano, class piano and piano ensemble. She often presents lecture recitals on various topics for area music teachers groups and is in demand for judging auditions and competitions.
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Richard Reber
is Professor of Piano at the University of Kansas,
where he has taught piano and piano literature since 1964. He is a graduate of the
Eastman School of Music, where he studied piano with Cécile Staub Genhart. In 1962
he received a Fulbright Scholarship for study at the Academy of Music in Vienna, Austria.
He furthered his studies with Frank Mannheimer and in 1973 became a
founding member of the Mannheimer Piano Festival Association. Mr. Reber is an active
recitalist and is recognized as an outstanding lecture-recitalist in the field of twentieth-century
piano music as well as the traditional repertoire. He presents recitals,
lecture-recitals, and workshops throughout the United States and recently lectured and
performed in Japan. His orchestral appearances include the premieres of two concertos,
and he has performed with the Dorian Wind Quintet. Mr. Reber has received numerous research
grants from the University of Kansas. His recording of intermediate level twentieth-century
piano music, entitled Kanzona, was the result of one such grant.
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Jennifer Shoup
currently serves as Archivist for the American Matthay Association for the Piano. She received a Master of Music degree in Piano Performance and Certificate in Piano Pedagogy from
Carnegie Mellon University and a Bachelor of Music degree in Performance from the University of Dayton. She
began Doctoral studies at Arizona State University. Her teachers include Donald Hageman, Eric Street, Enrique
Graf and Caio Pagano. Additional studies took place in Vienna, Austria and at Belgais Center for the Arts
(Portugal).
Jennifer has been a featured soloist with the National Orchestras of Chile, Costa Rica and the University of
Dayton Orchestra. She has presented solo recitals for the Piccolo Spoleto Festival Piano Series (South Carolina), Sigma Alpha Iota National Convention (Florida) and numerous faculty artist series across the United States. She frequently lectures, recently presenting a lecture-recital for the American Matthay Association for Piano at the University of Kansas and the Ohio Federation of Music Clubs Convention held in Cleveland. She has worked with a diverse range of artists including Emanuel Ax, Maria Joao Pires, Earl Wild and Grammy award-winning composer Lucy Simon.
Jennifer has taught for the prestigious Carnegie Mellon Prep School and as adjunct faculty for Cedarville University and the University of Dayton. She currently owns The Piano Preparatory School and Beavercreek Music, serving more than two hundred families in Dayton, Ohio.
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Stephen SiekHe has also recently annotated a series of CDs for APR commemorating Matthay's pupils—including Harriet Cohen, Irene Scharrer, Myra Hess, Bartlett & Robertson, an extensive collection of rare discs featuring Matthay's own recordings, and a recent recording releasing all the solo discs of British pianist Cyril Smith. For the Hyperion label, he has annotated a highly praised disc of the solo works of Charles Griffes performed by Garrick Ohlsson, and for Deutsche Grammophon he annotated the debut disc devoted to Grainger and Rachmaninoff by the brilliant Chinese pianist Moye Chen. For the Eloquence division of Decca, he has annotated several discs, including the recent reissue of the 1941-42 recordings of the 24 Rachmaninoff Preludes by Moura Lympany, the complete Decca recordings (7 CDs) of Moura Lympany, the complete Deutsche Grammophon recordings of Andor Foldes (19 CDs), and the complete Deccas of Ruth Slenczynska (10 CDs). Siek's interests have also extended to other areas of American history and culture, and he has published and lectured widely on the earlier work of architect Frank Lloyd Wright, including a three-lecture series on Wright's early work in Chicago in July of 2013. He holds the B. Mus. and the M. Mus. degrees from the University of Maryland and a Ph.D. from the College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati. In May of 2019, at a ceremony in London, he was made an Honorary Associate of the Royal Academy of Music. A professor emeritus of music at Wittenberg University in Ohio, he now lives in Tempe, Arizona, where he frequently gives both live and online courses for Arizona State University, and where he maintains a studio.
Jane Luther Smith
received the Licentiate Performer’s Diploma in Piano (L.R.A.M.) from the Royal Academy of Music in London. Her work with first-generation Matthay students includes extensive study with Denise Lassimonne in England and additional work with Frank Mannheimer in the United States. She earned the Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees (cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa) in piano performance and the post-graduate Performer's Certificate in piano from the University of South Carolina, where her teachers included AMAP members W. John Williams and John Kenneth Adams. Miss Smith was also a student of the late Elizabeth Newell at Coker College in Hartsville, South Carolina.
Her experience as a performer in the United States has been varied, including appearances in California, Colorado, Georgia, Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. She has also performed in England, Canada, and Eastern Europe. In June of 2012 she performed a lecture/recital on the music of Robert Schumann at the Fourth World Piano Conference in Novi Sad, Serbia, where she was the only pianist representing South Carolina and was one of just twenty specially invited pianists from the United States who participated in the conference with more than 100 international pianists. The conference was held at the Isidor Bajic Music School.
As an avid promoter of historic architectural preservation, Miss Smith has been a featured piano soloist in several concerts with the string orchestra from the Charleston Symphony performing the Bach F minor Concerto, benefitting two of South Carolina’s landmarks—the Church of the Holy Cross in Stateburg and the Bishopville Opera House. Her music history research includes a special interest in American music of the 1920s “Jazz Age." In June of 2010 she presented a lecture/recital in the Legacy Theater at Columbus State University in Columbus, Georgia, where she performed transcriptions of popular standards as performed by legendary jazz pianist Art Tatum.
A first-prize winner of the prestigious Clara Wells Piano Competition presented by the American Matthay Association for Piano, and a recipient of a Chattanooga Cotton Ball Fellowship for Advanced study in Music, Miss Smith has been a featured performer on the South Carolina Educational TV and Radio networks. She has recorded two CDs of classical piano music and received the “Woman of Achievement” in the area of Fine Arts presented by the South Carolina YWCA of the Upper Lowlands, Inc.
In addition to her demand as a solo recitalist, she is a full-time music faculty member of the University of South Carolina Sumter. Jane Luther Smith is listed on the South Carolina Arts Commission Approved Performing Artist Roster. She is owner of the Jane Luther Smith Piano Studios in Sumter and is organist for the historic Church of the Ascension (Episcopal) in Hagood.
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Steven Herbert Smith
professor emeritus of piano at Penn State, is the current President of the American Matthay Association for Piano. He has performed throughout the world, including solo recitals and concertos as recently as 2022. He has recorded solo recitals for the French, German and Spanish national radios, Radio 4 Hong Kong, and America’s PBS Television. His recent projects include a comprehensive, acclaimed series of Beethoven recitals and compact discs called Piano Masterworks of Beethoven (released on Soundwaves, available on Amazon, and reviewed with superlatives by Alan Becker in the American Record Guide), including all the 32 Sonatas and many other beloved works of the Beethoven repertoire. Other recent performances include Beethoven presentations and master classes in Beijing and Zhengzhou, China. He performed a lecture-recital at the London International Piano Symposium, 2015. Steven Herbert Smith’s degrees include the DMA and M.Mus. from the Eastman School of Music, as well as the Artist’s Diploma from the Mozarteum of Salzburg, Austria. His artist teachers included Cécile Genhart and Kurt Neumüller. More recently he worked in Vienna with the celebrated pianist Paul Badura-Skoda regarding aspects of the Beethoven repertoire.
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Christopher Thompson
serves as Associate
Professor of Music at Williams Baptist College in Walnut Ridge, Arkansas, where he has taught
since 1998. At Williams, he teaches all of the music theory and aural skills courses as well
as music fundamentals, music appreciation, applied piano, and composition. He currently serves
as president of the Delta Music Teachers Association of northeast Arkansas and president of
the Schubert Music Club (affiliated with the Arkansas Federation of Music Clubs). With the
Arkansas State Music Teachers Association (ASMTA), he currently serves as an elected board
member, chair of the student composition competition, and co-chair of state auditions. In
2010 he was named Arkansas Music Teacher of the Year by ASMTA, and in 2011 he received
certification as a Nationally Certified Teacher of Music by the Music Teachers National
Association. From 2009-2011, Dr. Thompson served as president of the south central chapter
(Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas) of the College Music Society.
He received a B.M. in piano from the University of Kansas, an M.A. in music from the
University of Missouri at Kansas City, and a Ph.D. in music theory from the University
of Wisconsin at Madison. His principal piano teachers are Patricia M. Thompson, Karen
Halverhout, Richard Reber,
Richard Angeletti, John McIntyre, Carroll Chilton, and Howard Karp.
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David Watkins
Shuko Watanabe Petty 
