Teaching Approach

I believe every student, regardless of age, experience, or strengths, has the innate ability to learn and enjoy music. My goal is to empower my students with supportive and informed guidance, to become well-rounded, life-long musicians who can express themselves creatively through music. 

I specialize in music cognition and universal music education. This means I love to guide learners of all levels and neurotypes (Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia, etc.), through the music learning process to help them discover the ways they uniquely hear and comprehend music. Lessons are carefully designed and sequenced to student’s individual interests, strengths, and needs, so they can successfully and enjoyably build a strong musical foundation.

My lessons may look a little different from what you've seen in other studios. Students often dance and sing, play with toys, throw scarves, and start composing at their very first lessons. This enables them to grasp note reading, writing, and theory much easier after they've established a solid auditory foundation. But as non-traditional as this approach may seem, it’s actually very traditional. The method books many teachers use today are a fairly recent pedagogical shift within the past century with very little scientific or psychological backing. The greats that everyone tends to think of (Mozart, Beethoven, or Bach) learned through their ears and composing!

As a music education researcher and current graduate student, I use cognitively-informed frameworks such as Music Learning Theory (MLT), a holistic and scientifically-backed approach developed by Dr. Edwin E. Gordon. Such frameworks focus on nurturing musical skills through active listening and movement to develop auditaion, or the ability to comprehend music. This means my students learn far more than simply decoding notes on a page and pushing the corresponding piano key. They learn to improvise, play by ear, and compose with joy. And yes, they learn to read music too!

You can learn more about Music Learning Theory and Dr. Gordon's research at the Gordon Institute for Music Learning.