Louise Kupelian Collection

Louise Kupelian, a graduate of Philadelphia Conservatory of Music, studied for three years with Madame Olga Samaroff-Stokowski. She also studied harmony and counterpoint under Vincent Persichetti and later attended the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she studied piano with Leonard Shure and continued her work in composition with Herbert Elwell. Kupelian furthered her graduate studies at Columbia University in New York, where she specialized in piano pedagogy under Robert Pace.

Kupelian concertized widely in the East and Midwest, both as a soloist and as a member of a two-piano team, and was a performing artist member of the Friday Morning Music Club and the Arts Club of Washington, D.C. for many years. A member of the Washington Music Teachers' Association and the Maryland State Music Teachers' Association, Kupelian was certified in 1987 as a Master Teacher - the highest award given by the Music Teachers' National Association to its members. As a member of the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi and a consultant for the International Piano Teaching Foundation, she presented numerous pedagogy and master classes for piano teachers in the Washington, D.C. area.

Kupelian pursued an intensive study of jazz improvisation at the University of Maryland graduate school, studying with Ron Elliston, and became a member of the International Association of Jazz Educators. She published in the field of jazz education ("What's So Great About Jazz?" - Keys Magazine, 1989), and her composition, "Theme and Variations on Happy Birthday," (Warner Bros. 1995) represents a marriage of classical and jazz styles. She enjoys the creative challenge which is at the heart of jazz, and her greatest joy is in teaching teachers the art of jazz.

Louise Kupelian died on October 18, 2011 at age 89.