Outstanding Artist Piano Competition (OAPC) 2023 Recap

It was so good to meet and greet everyone during the Outstanding Artist Piano Competition in Ellensburg! It was a full three days with 48 in performance beginning Friday morning, November 10, and continuing all day on Saturday and Sunday. There were 29 students entered in Junior Division and 19 in Senior Division, representing 25 teachers.

I would like to thank Michelle Mielke, Chair of the WSMTA Education Board, Colleen Hunter, WSMTA President and Amanda Harris, WSMTA Vice President for their encouragement and work. We all thank Preta Laughlin for her time and energy in making sure everybody working competitions was taken care of for snacks and lunchtimes; to Kirsten Carlsen, WSMTA Administrative Coordinator, for her help with registrations and communication tasks overall; and to Julie Swienty for being the MTNA/WSMTA Competitions Coordinator and for her communication with the support staff at CWU especially. Thank you also to Jani Stoehr, (Program Repertoire Researching and Formatting) for extra research with titles, opus numbers and clarifications needed to make the printed program as accurate as possible and for formatting it as well.  Thank you also to Dr. Jay Mauchley for proof-reading the printed program (repertoire titles) to ensure as much accuracy as possible! I owe a debt of gratitude to Samantha Yeung and Kirsten Carlson for their encouragement and publishing the competition results quickly as we moved through the weekend days.

A huge thank you is extended to our 2023 OAPC Judges: Dr. Jason Kuo, NCTM, Dr. Lark Powers, NCTM, and Mr. Jeffrey Gilliam, NCTM. It was a pleasure to work with them! Our Monitors this year were Patti Robertson, NCTM, and Jani Stoehr, NCTM. I so appreciate their ongoing service and commitment to WSMTA and our students!

Cherie Felts, OAPC Chair