KEYBOARD FACULTY
Pianist Christopher Guzman, assistant professor in piano, has entertained audiences throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. A prizewinner in many international competitions, including the Walter M. Naumburg Competition, the Seoul International Music Competition, and the Isang Yun Competition of South Korea, he has performed as soloist with many large ensembles, including the San Antonio Symphony, the Fort Worth Symphony, the Corpus Christi Symphony, and The EOS Orchestra of New York City. He has performed concerti with the Juilliard Orchestra in Alice Tully Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, and in Spoleto, Italy, during the orchestra’s first summer residency at the 2003 Festival Dei Due Mondi. Guzman has appeared in recitals in such varied venues as Carnegie’s Weill Hall, Boston’s Jordan Hall, and Spoleto’s Teatro Caio Melisso.
An avid chamber musician, Guzman has performed in Tokyo’s Suntory Hall, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, the Kennedy Center, San Francisco Performances, the Vancouver Recital Series, and others. He performs regularly with sought-after soloists such as violinists Tai Murray and Stephan Jackiw, and trombonist Joe Alessi of the New York Philharmonic; his recital with violinist Ilya Gringolts on National Public Radio’s Saint Paul Sunday continues to be broadcast across the United States and online. Guzman also frequently collaborates with the Chameleon Chamber Players of Boston, recipients of the 2007 CMA/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming.
Of special interest to Guzman is music of our time. He has collaborated with one of the nation’s preeminent contemporary chamber ensembles, Speculum Musicae, and numerous times with the New Juilliard Ensemble, including tours of the United States and France. The New York Times hailed his “coiled, explosive playing” of works by Christopher Theofanidis and Joseph Pereira at New York’s Society for Ethical Culture in 2002. He is a member of Second Instrumental Unit, a provocative new music ensemble based in the Northeast, and has participated in world premieres by such composers as Donald Martino, Bernd Franke, and Paul Schoenfield.
A Texas native, Guzman began studying piano at age 9 and violoncello two years later. He has studied at the University of Texas at Austin, New England Conservatory, and the Juilliard School.
Sue Haug is director of the School of Music at Penn State. She joined the Penn State faculty in 2005 after having served on the faculty at Iowa State University for thirty years and as head of the Department of Music for fifteen years. She has received leadership awards at both institutions. In 2003, she was honored to be the first recipient of the Iowa State Award for Departmental Leadership, and she received the 2010 Penn State Commission for Women Achieving Woman Award in Administration. She is currently chair of the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) Commission on Accreditation and member of the NASM Executive Committee and Board of Directors. She served as associate chair of the commission from 2007 to 2010 and as a member from 2001 to 2006. She is president of the Board of Regents for Pi Kappa Lambda, national music honorary society, and past president of the Iowa Music Teachers Association, where she received the organization’s Distinguished Service Award.
Haug teaches piano and score reading. She is a collaborative pianist and, with her colleagues at Iowa State, developed and toured in three original music-dramas on the lives and music of Clara Schumann, Johannes Brahms, and Nadia Boulanger. Her research has focused on sight-reading at the piano and cognitive psychology as it applies to the learning of music. Haug’s articles have been published in the American Music Teacher, Clavier, and Keyboard Companion, and she has been invited to give presentations at national meetings of the College Music Society, Music Teachers National Association, the National Conference on Piano Pedagogy, and Sigma Alpha Iota. She holds undergraduate and master's degrees from the University of Wisconsin at Madison and a doctor of musical arts degree from the University of Iowa.
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Timothy Shafer received the Pennsylvania Music Teachers Association Teacher of the Year Award for 1997. He teaches studio piano and coordinates the class piano and piano pedagogy programs at both undergraduate and graduate levels.
Shafer earned the bachelor of music degree in piano performance from the Oberlin Conservatory, where he won several performing awards, including the Rudolf Serkin Outstanding Pianist Award. He received master's and doctoral degrees in piano performance from Indiana University, where he was the winner of the prestigious annual Concerto Competition, performing the Tchaikowsky Concerto in B-flat minor.
Shafer appeared in Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall in 1995 as member of Duo Concertant and returned in 1997 for his solo debut. In addition to maintaining an active solo recital and chamber music schedule in the United States, he has concertized, taught and adjudicated in South America and Asia. He is an active master-class clinician and competition adjudicator throughout the country for professional music organizations and colleges, and is a frequent soloist with many regional orchestras. Shafer is the co-author of Class Piano for Adult Beginners, published by Prentice-Hall. His articles on piano teaching have appeared in the Piano Pedagogy Forum and in the American Music Teacher. He has recently completed a six year span of service on the board of the National Conference of Keyboard Pedagogy, serving as co-chair for the Student Committee.
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For more on Timothy Shafer's recordings, see Duo Concertante
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Steven Herbert Smith has performed recitals and concertos throughout the world and has recorded solo recitals for the French, German, and Spanish national radios, Radio 4 Hong Kong, and America’s PBS. To see reviews, follow the links below. His compact discs appear on the Cambria and Innova labels. He has given many master classes and lecture recitals for universities and teacher associations in the United States and abroad, including the University of Melbourne, Australia, Hong Kong’s Academy of Performing Arts, and Glasgow’s Royal Scottish Academy among others. Recently he has focused on a comprehensive series of recitals of Beethoven’s sonata and other repertoire. He received critical acclaim for his series of new-music solo recitals, Piano Entente, presented at Merkin Concert Hall in New York and at St. John’s Smith Square, London. Smith was honored in 2005 with the PSU College of Arts and Architecture’s Faculty Award for Outstanding Teaching; previously he won the Teacher of the Year Award of the Pennsylvania Music Teachers’ Association. His students have won significant national awards, including the Fulbright Scholarship and the Clara Wells Competition of the Matthay Association. In the Music Teachers National Association competitions since 1991, four of his Penn State students have been national semifinalists (Pennsylvania winners). Steven Herbert Smith received a bachelor’s degree summa cum laude from Baylor University and Master’s and D.M.A. degrees from The Eastman School of Music, as well as an Artist’s Diploma from the Mozarteum of Salzburg, Austria, where he was a Fulbright scholar. His teachers included Cécile Genhart and Kurt Neumüller.
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