MMTA Piano Competition

On November 6, 2016, piano professor Dr. Clara Christian took applied piano students Loran Wiley, Caleb Vester, Brian Hofmann, T. J. Goze, Kaylen Draschil, and Daniel Tague to the annual Missouri Music Teachers Association (MMTA) piano competition at Evangel University in Springfield, Missouri. These competitions are held in different locations throughout the state of Missouri. MMTA is an organization dedicated to advancing the value of music study and music performance.

Since Dr. Christian’s tenure at College of the Ozarks, she has made it a priority to enter her students into piano competitions. Dr. Christian explained that “because applied students are required to have three pieces by the end of the semester, I think these competitions are excellent motivators to get students to start working on their repertoire for their juries during finals week.” Dr. Christian has required most of the piano majors and her advanced applied piano students to compete in a competition every semester. Dr. Christian stressed the importance of performing in front of an audience, saying, “The more you perform, the better you get at handling your nerves.”

Many students often come to appreciate competing at different colleges. “The more competitions I enter, the more I seem to enjoy them,” Caleb Vester, a senior piano major said, “I like listening to the other pianists in these competitions; it helps me gauge where I am at musically. I also enjoy listening to my peers at these competitions. Being in these competitions, I think, helps build camaraderie among the applied piano students.”