Dr. Sigrid Luther, professor of music at Bryan College, was installed as vice president of the Music Teachers National Association during the association’s conference in Atlanta recently.

 

During her 30 years of membership in the association, Dr. Luther (pictured here on the right) has held many local, state, and division positions. At the national level, she has served on the board of directors, chaired the Code of Ethics Revision Committee, was named an MTNA Foundation Fellow, and is midway through a term as national coordinator for the high school competitions. 

 

Dr. Luther developed the piano pedagogy major at Bryan College; organized and advises the Chattanooga Area Collegiate Chapter of MTNA, the 2004 Chapter of the Year; and founded the Bryan College Community Music School. She has received outstanding teaching awards from Bryan College, the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, the Chattanooga Music Teachers Association and the Tennessee MTA. Her students have won numerous state competitions and area concerto contests, and have gone on to private, conservatory and university teaching positions as well as church appointments

 

She said she plans to develop a manual for MTNA national performance competition coordinators as a project during her vice-presidency. 

 

At the Atlanta MTNA conference, Dr. Luther also performed as guest artist for the Ingrid Clarfield session “Preparing Students for Auditions and Competitions: Turning Fear into Fun.” Professor Clarfield (pictured above on left), a nationally-recognized clinician and author, lost the use of her left hand to a stroke two years ago. She cancelled all of her public engagements, but forgot that she had agreed to present a workshop for the Chattanooga Music Teachers Association in February 2008. She decided to try the presentation in Chattanooga with Dr. Luther playing all the left hand parts of her musical examples. Since then, Prof. Clarfield has resumed regular workshop engagements and has collaborated with Dr. Luther at the World Piano Pedagogy Conference in Dallas last October and most recently at the MTNA Conference in Atlanta.