Piano with Dr Yelena G.

Since 1999, I have enjoyed teaching Classical piano, chamber music, keyboard skills, music theory, music history, and writing on music. I offer lessons in English and in Russian, and welcome students of all ages and levels. I integrate the discussion of pianistic issues, such as cultivation of beautiful tone and phrasing with other disciplines, including history, theory, psychology. I seek to inspire my students to cherish Music as a vital part of their lives, which our increasingly robotized world needs more than ever! OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY: Hailed for having “established herself as a very fine interpreter…” (NYCR), Yelena is highly regarded for her intellectual depth, keen musical insight, and passionate performances as both a solo lecture-performer and a chamber musician with a strong preference for unusual and innovative thematic programming. As a winner of the Artists International Competition (2005), she performed her sold-out New York Debut recital of the Baroque Reflections program at Carnegie’s Weill Hall and was highly acclaimed for her “grand performance in a grand tradition” (NYCR). She has been a regular guest lecture-recitalist at The Harvard Club, where she has showcased a wide array of thematic programs, such as The Bach Project, The Art of Chaconne, Humor in Music, and Music and Dance. She has given an extensive series of thematic solo and chamber music performances in tribute to birthday anniversaries of Mendelssohn, Schumann, Liszt, Alkan, C.P.E. Bach, Strauss, Tchaikovsky, Busoni, Czerny, and Dvorak with recent guest performances at The Metropolitan Museum’s Balcony Bar with flutist Suzanne Buerkle and New York’s Bohemian National Hall with violinist Emilie-Anne Gendron. She is an Adjunct Professor at Fordham University, where she instructs music history and piano, and serves as a chamber music coach. She is also on the piano faculty at the Crestwood Music Education Center in Eastchester, New York, and maintains an active private piano studio on the Upper West Side. She is also a passionate leader and entrepreneur as the founder and the artistic director of a classical salon series – an intimate and enlightening series of Classical home salons on the Upper West Side, having presented renowned pianists such as Jerome Lowenthal, Oxana Yablonskaya, and Madeline Bruser, clarinetist Julian Milkis, Juilliard’s Professor of Music, Michael Musgrave, and NYU’s Professor of Music, Michael Beckerman. Previously, at Juilliard, she has been a faculty member in the Piano Minor Department and taught the undergraduate course on Piano Topics. She has also coached piano-duo and chamber-music groups in Columbia University’s Music Department and was the organizer of the Barnard-Columbia-Juilliard concert series at Columbia’s Miller Theater. Born in Moscow, Yelena began her professional piano studies at The Gnessin School of Music for Gifted Children at the age of five. As a student in the joint degree program, she graduated from Barnard College at Columbia University summa cum laude, and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, with a major in English Literature and a minor in Philosophy. She holds both her M.Mus and DMA degrees in Piano Performance from The Juilliard School, where she studied jointly with Jerome Lowenthal and Oxana Yablonskaya, as well as privately with Richard Goode.