Fay Swadley Adams, Associate Professor Emeritus, has retired after forty-four years of service to the University of Tennessee School of Music. While at the university she served as the Coordinator of the Keyboard Area and taught piano, piano pedagogy and Suzuki pedagogy. Her awards include: YWCA Outstanding Woman in the Arts; Chancellor’s Citation for Service to the University of Tennessee; first recipient of the Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award in the UT School of Music; University of Tennessee Volunteer Spirit Award; Music Teachers National Association Foundation Fellow; TMTA Distinguished Service Award; Past Director of MTNA Southern Division;  Member of the MTNA Board of Directors; and the 2016 MTNA National Teacher of the Year. She is a registered Suzuki Piano Teacher Trainer, former member of the Suzuki Association of the Americas Board of Directors and the Piano Review Committee. She has served as a Suzuki piano clinician at workshops and institutes across the United States, Mexico, Bermuda, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. Fay is currently maintaining a private piano studio and continuing her work with MTNA, SAA and the Suzuki Piano School of Knoxville.

A 1978 graduate of Dr. Suzuki’s Matsumoto Talent Education Institute, Judy Bossuat-Gallic’s contact with Dr. Suzuki began in 1974 and continued yearly through 1990. A registered Suzuki Teacher Trainer for SAA and the European Suzuki Association, she is an honorary member of ESA in recognition for her 16 years of pioneer work during the early days of the Suzuki Method in Europe. Bossuat has taught violin and trained teachers for 50 years at over 400 International Conferences, Institutes and Workshops all over the world.  Known for silently teaching large groups of children, she offers lessons and teacher training online, in Lodi, C.A. and Geneseo N.Y. A past board member of the American String Teachers Association and the National String Project Consortium, she also has held faculty positions at Sacramento State University, University of the Pacific, and University of Oregon. Currently she is a member of the new SAA Suzuki Training Committee.

Pianist Maeve Brophy returned to her hometown of Memphis in 2019. Since then, she has been recruited as a substitute music director for Opera Memphis and a pianist for the Memphis Symphony. She is also a member of Blueshift and Luna Nova Ensemble, performing regularly at the Continuum and Belvedere festivals, respectively. She is Head of Piano Studies at the Brown Baptist Academy of Music in Southaven, MS, former Music Director of the Open Heart Spiritual Center, and a collaborative pianist at the University of Mississippi. In 2019, she performed numerous times at the Green Room at Crosstown Arts and for the Crosstown Theater Silent Film Series. She also performed her own composition, “Elegy No. 1”, at numerous venues around Memphis. In the spring of 2020, she did a series of “Hunkering Down” solo piano jazz videos for her YouTube channel. In the fall of 2020, Maeve was a Resident Artist with Crosstown Arts and released a Beethoven concert video for the Beethoven Club in Memphis. She maintains a private teaching studio (currently virtual) and devotes time to promoting solo and chamber music by women, nonbinary composers, and composers of color. She has made numerous solo videos of neglected solo piano music by women and nonbinary composers for her YouTube channel.

From 2011-2019, Maeve was a collaborative pianist at the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. She also taught piano at Belmont University, and she is a charter member of the Nashville-based contemporary ensemble Chatterbird. She is half of The Brophy Sisters, a duo with violinist Linnaea Brophy. She studied piano performance at the Manhattan School of Music, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, New England Conservatory of Music, and Texas Christian University. She currently lives in Bartlett, TN, with her daughter.

Patricia D’Ercole is a Suzuki violin teacher and teacher trainer. She completed a master’s degree with an emphasis in Suzuki with Margery Aber and, in 1988, studied in Japan with Dr. Suzuki. She has been a clinician in 22 states in the U.S., Puerto Rico, Canada, Finland, Estonia, Peru, Chile, and Taiwan. Pat has written numerous articles for the American Suzuki Journal, was chair of the Suzuki Association (SAA) Board of Directors, and served as a member of the SAA committees that developed Every Child Can! and the Suzuki Principles in Action courses. She was the founder and first president of the Suzuki Association of Wisconsin and has been on the planning committee for the International Research Symposium on Talent Education since its inception in 1991 and has served as its coordinator since 1995. Through her leadership, a collection of videos which chronicles the two weeks of Dr. Suzuki’s teaching at the American Suzuki Institute in Stevens Point in 1976, The American Suzuki Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point: The Suzuki Method in Action, is now preserved on the web. In 2002, she was the recipient of the American Suzuki Institute’s Suzuki Chair Award, and in 2008 became a Distinguished Instructional Specialist at UWSP. Pat began the UWSP Suzuki Strings Mentoring Program in 2010, an online year-long mentoring program for Suzuki teachers to improve their teaching skills while teaching in their home studios. Most recently, Pat was the Director of the Aber Suzuki Center at the UW-Stevens Point.

Department Chair of Communications, Graphic and Fine Arts at Southwest Tennessee Community College
Professor – Graphic Arts Technology

I hold an Associate Degree in Fine Arts/Advertising from Northwest Junior College, a B.F.A. in Advertising/Commercial Art, a B.F.A. in Photography and a M.F.A. in Computer Graphics from Memphis College of Art. I have been in the Graphic Arts field for over 30 years. During my career I have been the Art Director for Satellite Dish Magazine, Artcraft Converters, DCR Graphics, and Sawtelle Printing. I also owned FancherPhillips Graphic Solutions. As well as a Freelance Graphic Designer producing package design for Snap-on-Tools, printed material for Pemko, Memphis Business Products and COGIC. I also produced COGICS’s interactive Convocation Journal and Virtual tours.

I taught for Memphis College of Art for nine years and State Technical Institute for four years as an Adjunct Instructor. I have been a fulltime Instructor at Southwest for 17 years and a Department Chair for 11 of those. I am presently the Department Chair for Communications, Graphic and Fine Arts department.

As Department Chair I provides leadership, management, planning, and advocacy for faculty and programs within the unit, which are Fine Arts, Graphic Arts, Music, Photography, Speech and Theater.

As a Professor in the Graphic Arts Technology program I teach or have taught all classes in the Print Production and Interactive Multimedia concentrations.

Lori Gilbert is a violin teacher from Memphis, Tennessee. As a child, she was nurtured by teacher Lisa Love.  Lori embraced becoming a Suzuki teacher at a young age and is now a Suzuki mom to her three children, Isai, Calum, and Eva. She completed long-term training with Kimberly Meier-Simms and Libby Armour and short-term training with Nancy Jackson and Ed Kreitman. Lori has maintained a violin studio for over 25 years. After completing both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Violin Performance under the tutelage of Dr. Soh-Hyun Altino, she continued her violin studies with Yoko Takebe and Michael Gilbert, formerly of the New York Philharmonic. Lori enjoys playing chamber music with her violinist husband, Daniel. 

A native of Bulgaria, Lora Gubanov has given many successful performances in the United States, Europe, and Asia. Mrs. Gubanov earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Piano Performance from the University of Memphis in 2016, with a full teaching assistantship in Class Piano. She is an Assistant Professor of Music at LeMoyne-Owen College and the founder of Memphis Music Studio, where she nurtures the next generation of musical talent. As an enthusiastic educator and performer, Lora has received awards in numerous national and international competitions. In 2017, Dr. Gubanov was nominated for the prestigious Steinway Top Teacher Award and in the summer of 2018, she joined the esteemed faculty of the East/West International Piano Festival in Shenzhen, China, teaching private lessons and chamber music. The following year, she expanded her international presence, teaching and performing in Seoul, South
Korea, including concertizing with her duo partner, Dr. Olivia Ellis, as part of the Chiara Piano Duo. In recognition of her contributions to music education, Dr. Gubanov was recently honored as a Steinway Teacher and Educational Partner by Amro Music in Memphis. Beyond teaching and performing, Dr. Gubanov serves as Chair of the Greater Memphis Music Teachers Association Auditions Committee. She is a U.S. nationally certified teacher of music (NCTM) and a Certified Suzuki Instructor, holding credentials in all seven levels of the Suzuki Method.

Esther Humphries was inspired to teach Suzuki violin after her first long-term training course in 2009 with Libby Armour. Since then, she has taught students throughout the Memphis area from her home, at the Bellevue Baptist Church School of Performing Arts, at Union University, and currently at the Midtown Suzuki Cooperative. 

Esther started piano lessons at age 5 and violin lessons at age 7. She attended Calvin College, where she graduated with a B.A. in music and history in 2009. She received her Masters’ degree and Artist Diploma in Violin Performance from the University of Memphis in 2011 and 2013, studying under Dr. Soh-Hyun Altino. Esther has performed solo recitals in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and West Tennessee, and she has performed concertos with the Youngstown Symphony Youth Orchestra, the Calvin College Orchestra, the Union University Orchestra, and the Jakarta Symphony Orchestra, in Jakarta, Indonesia. She is currently an active performer and teacher in the Memphis area, playing often in the Memphis Symphony.

Annette Lee has been on the faculty of the MacPhail Center for Music since 1995. Ms. Lee is a frequent performer in the Twin Cities as an active collaborator with colleagues and students.  As a Teacher Trainer, she has taught many workshops in the U.S. and Canada. Most recently, Ms. Lee  was invited to teach at the International Teacher Trainers Convention in Matsumoto, Japan as the only representative from North America. In addition to her teaching students at MacPhail, she has created a Fellowship Program at MacPhail, training new Suzuki Piano Teachers in Minneapolis.

Ms. Lee began her teaching career in the Chicago area at DePaul University Community Music Program and the Music Institute of Chicago.  She was a Fellowship student at the University of Michigan and holds a Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree in Piano Performance.  Additional training includes the Aspen Music Festival, Blossom Music Festival and the Chicago Suzuki Institute.

Mary Ann Mears is originally from the Memphis, TN area. She studied violin with William Starr at the University of Tennessee and graduated with a Bachelor of Music degree in Suzuki String Techniques. She studied with Dr. Shinichi Suzuki in Matsumoto during the summers of 1976, 1978, 1982 and 1983. She taught in the Denver, Colorado area from 1980 until 2005. While there, she was a founding member of the Suzuki Association of Colorado. Other training includes certification as a Montessori Infant and Toddler directress. She currently maintains a private violin studio in Germantown, TN.

Cellist ELIZABETH MIKHAEL made her Carnegie Hall debut as soloist with Pinchas Zuckerman and the Manhattan School of Music’s Chamber Sinfonia and was a Fellow for three consecutive summers at the Tanglewood Music Center. Awarded the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Karl Zeise Memorial Cello Prize, Ms. Mikhael holds degrees from the University of Southern California, the Manhattan School of Music’s distinguished Orchestral Performance Program, and the Universität der Künste Berlin as a Fellowship recipient from the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung. Highlight solo performances include sold-out classical recitals in New York’s Carnegie Hall and Mexico City’s Palacio de Bellas Artes with pianist Santiago Piñeirúa and with Vox Anima London under the baton of James Meaders at Southwark Cathedral. Ms. Mikhael toured the US with Rez Abbasi’s star- studded jazz band, Invocation, and is featured on his album “Unfiltered Universe” with Rudresh Manahthappa, Vijay lyer, Johannes Weidenmueller, and Dan Weiss.

Equally at home as both a performer and teacher, Ms. Mikhael completed her Suzuki Teacher Training at the School for Strings in New York City with Pamela Devenport and has studied Suzuki pedagogy with Allen Lieb, Carey Beth Hockett, Carey Cheney and Gilda Barston. She has taught at workshops and institutes internationally. After eight years as a faculty member at the School for Strings in New York City, Ms. Mikhael maintains a private studio in Washington. She serves as a board member for the Suzuki Association of Washington State.

Martin Palacios holds a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in Music from Pensacola Christian College, as well as a second Master of Music in Suzuki Pedagogy from the Scheidt’s School of Music at the University of Memphis. Martin’s music career began in Pensacola during his senior year of college when he started teaching private lessons and conducting the intermediate string orchestra at Pensacola Christian Academy. 

When Martin came to Memphis in January of 2014 to pursue his second master’s degree, he became actively involved in the Music Ministry at Bellevue Baptist Church. It was at Bellevue he started teaching Suzuki violin and viola with their School of Performing Arts. His students at Bellevue are actively involved in Memphis Youth Symphony, Germantown Youth Symphony, and area competitions including All-West with many of them going all the way to All-State. His students are involved in church ministries including Bellevue’s Sanctuary and Pop Orchestras, community engagements, and nursing home outreaches. 

In addition to teaching violin and viola at Bellevue, Martin is an active performer. Currently, he serves as a sectional violinist and assistant concertmaster with the Jackson Symphony Orchestra, holds the concertmaster position for Bellevue’s orchestras, and regularly substitutes with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra.

Outside of music, Martin enjoys drawing, writing and arranging music, playing Ultimate Frisbee with friends, and spending lots of time with his wife Bonnie (also an avid music lover), their 3-year old daughter, Raven, (who just graduated to a real violin from her purple box violin), and their 9-month old son, Felix (who is being nurtured with much love).

Carissa Perez began her studies in violin at the age of three, north of Chicago, under the tutelage of Lisa Chodorowski. She is a Summa Cum Laude graduate of The Hartt School, obtaining both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees under Anton Miller, and her Suzuki concentration with Christie Felsing. She is an avid performer as well, performing regularly with professional orchestras in the greater Memphis area – including both the Memphis and Jackson Symphonies.

Being taught Suzuki from a young age as well as making it her livelihood, she has had a myriad of students over the years of all levels. The most rewarding feeling is teaching aspiring violinists how to paint a picture with their instruments, using her experience to provide an environment that promotes and fosters not only creativity, but learning. Each student is met with the utmost care, balancing the line between positive encouragement and rigor to promote curiosity, self-awareness, and most of all, the love of making music.

In her spare time, Carissa enjoys reading, the outdoors, and spending time with her friends and loved ones.

Jane Kutscher Reed is an internationally recognized Suzuki Piano Teacher Trainer, Suzuki Piano Educator, Parent and Teacher Coach and Motivational Speaker from Greenville, SC. After earning a degree in Piano Performance from the University of Findlay, she found her calling in Suzuki Pedagogy. As she teaches throughout the US and other countries, she dedicates herself to promoting finer education for students, teachers and parents through deeper thinking, validated learning skills and building meaningful relationships between the child, parent and teacher.

Mrs. Reed is also an Independent Facilitator for Parenting the Love and Logic Way, a Certified Elite Life Coach, and Motivational Speaker. She premiered her course for educators, Teaching with Purpose, at Lenoir-Rhyne University in 2013.

She and her husband founded Solutionary Insights, an educational business, which is dedicated to Nurturing Thinking Minds. The unique signature of Solutionary Insights is the intertwining of the respect for the value of individuals, the belief that all are capable of excellence, and the resolve that fine and purposeful teaching and parenting develops outstanding abilities. Watch for their upcoming book, “Nurturing Thinking Minds: The Making of Thought Leaders.”™

Visit their website: www.solutionaryinsights.com

Julie Schmidt studied violin at the University of Memphis for 14 years with Michelle Pettigrew and Pak-Chung Cheng. She graduated from Thomas Edison State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Music with a focus in Violin Pedagogy and Early Childhood Education. She has received her Suzuki training through Book Seven and Practicum from various trainers around the country including Carrie Reuning-Hummel, Pat D’Ercole, Ann Montzka-Smelser, Ed Kreitman, Allen Leib, Lorraine Fink, Michelle George, Cathy Lee, and Christie Felsing. Her love is for children and guiding them down the road of learning music. She believes that loving a child is the greatest gift you can give, while requiring excellence produces great musicians. She has taught for 24 years at the Bellevue School of Performing Arts and at Midtown Suzuki Cooperative.

Lindsay Serdar is a Suzuki teacher in Fort Worth, Texas. She teaches Suzuki in the Schools at Hurst-Euless-Bedford ISD as well as holding a small home studio. She has appeared as a soloist with several orchestras throughout Texas, most recently the Mesquite Symphony and the Texas Chamber Music Project. Lindsay completed her Bachelor of Music in piano at the University of Illinois with Ian Hobson, and her Bachelor of Music and Music Education in violin at San Jose State University with Cecily Ward and the Cypress String Quartet. Lindsay has studied the Suzuki Method with Rita Hauck for piano, Daniel Gee Cordova for violin/viola, and David Strom for violin, as well as Alice Joy Lewis for ECC and violin Book 1 with Beth Titterington. Serdar has also taken SECE training and holds classes in the DFW area with sister Dr. Kate Jones, bass teacher trainer.

Samuel Sidhom is a dedicated and enthusiastic teacher with an M.M. in Sacred Music from the Cincinnati Christian Seminary. He is a Suzuki piano and Suzuki Recorder trained with the Suzuki Association of the Americas.

Mr. Sidhom is an active member of the Suzuki Association of the Americas, the American Recorder Society, and Early Music America.

Dr. Hannah Monk Truehart is a Suzuki violin teacher and performer in Memphis, TN. She runs an active violin studio of students ages 3-18 out of her home in Cordova, TN. Passionate about sharing her love of music with children, Hannah began her long-term Suzuki teacher training in 2013 with Libby Armour and continues to take courses with trainers such as Charles Krigbaum and Daina Staggs. Hannah is a recipient of the SAA Certificate of Achievement Level I and was awarded the Distinguished Young Teacher Award at the 2024 SAA/ASTA conference. In recent years, many of Hannah’s students have won and placed in the local Beethoven Club Young Artist competition, have been accepted to the TN All West and All State orchestras, and have been awarded scholarships to study music in college. Hannah is deeply committed to the development of her students, and it is her aim to foster an atmosphere of joy and excellence in every child’s lesson. She has become increasingly interested in how to apply the principles of the Suzuki method to unconventional student situations, including older beginners and tricky transfer students. An aspiring writer, she has also been published in various academic journals including the American Suzuki Journal. Hannah holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts from the University of Memphis, an M.M. in Music Performance from the University of Memphis and a B.M. in Music Performance from the University of North Texas where she graduated summa cum laude. She loves to study violin pedagogy and is always learning new approaches to teaching the instrument. In her spare time, she enjoys reading and spending time with her husband, cellist Carrington Truehart, and their daughter Sylvie.

Priscilla Tsai is a Taiwanese American violinist who grew up in Boston. She started playing violin at age 8.  She enjoys teaching students of all ages and encourages early beginners! As an avid lifelong learner, she attends as many Suzuki teacher trainer courses as possible. She loves the Starling Delay Symposium as a resource for her own playing and for teaching her students.  She loves the violin because of its potential as a tool to develop and grow each individual’s mind and soul.  Teachers that have shaped her heart and playing include, Kyung Sun Lee, Mikyung Kim, Laurie Smukler, Soh-hyun Altino, Michael Gilbert, Yoko Takebe, and Joy Brown Wiener. She currently lives in Memphis with her husband, Jordan, and their two dogs.

Mary Halverson Waldo received a BA in Music from the College of St Scholastica, and a Master of Music from the New England Conservatory, in Performance of Early Music (Recorder and Traverso). A member of Waldo Baroque and Friends, she has made guest appearances with North Carolina Baroque Orchestra, Trinity Episcopal Cathedral Choirs (Columbia, SC), Broad River Renaissance Band, the Bach Society of Minnesota, Chatham Baroque, Pittsburgh Opera, Fayerwether Friends, and Piccolo Spoleto, Charleston.

Ms. Waldo was a faculty member at MacPhail Center for Music (Minneapolis), and the Saint Paul Conservatory (MN), where she introduced recorder and flute into the Suzuki programs. She is a regular faculty member at music institutes and festivals throughout the United States, Canada, Latin America, and England. Her teenage recorder students have won honors and awards in competitions sponsored by Presidential Scholars in the Arts, and Piffaro! She is a registered Recorder Teacher Trainer for the Suzuki Association of the Americas, and the European Suzuki Association.

Formerly a Music Director for the Twin Cities Recorder Guild (the MN chapter of the American Recorder Society), Ms. Waldo has been a writer for the American Recorder magazine and the American Suzuki Journal, and has served on the boards of the American Recorder Society (ARS) and the American Recorder Teachers’ Association.