Coker's Matsuo named Steinway Artist

In a surprise campus presentation this week, Associate Professor of Music Will Carswell announced that Assistant Professor of Music Jun Matsuo has been designated a Steinway Artist.

“A pianist who achieves the title ‘Steinway Artist’ reveals to those who study with that artist, and those who hear that artist perform, that they are serious about their craft and are committed to extraordinary results as a teacher and performer,” said Carswell, who chairs Coker’s department of dance, music and theater, coordinates the music and music education programs and directs the choral studies program.

“Steinway & Sons is proud to welcome Jun Matsuo to our illustrious roster of Steinway Artists,” said Steinway & Sons President – Americas Ron Losby.  “Matsuo has demonstrated not only a commitment to personal excellence, but also a commitment to bringing out excellence in her students. It is especially fitting that Professor Matsuo teaches at Coker College, which has committed to becoming an All-Steinway School.”

In accepting the award, Matsuo deflected the attention from the prestigious accomplishment to her music, saying simply, “I’ll be playing here next Monday.”

Last month, the music program presented a gala concert to celebrate the College’s All-Steinway Initiative, a commitment to using Steinway-designed instruments in classrooms, practice studios and in performance spaces campus-wide and to engaging a Steinway Artist on the faculty.

Less than one percent of colleges and universities worldwide are designated as All-Steinway Institutions.  Coker will be one of only three colleges in South Carolina with this distinction.

Jyotindra Parekh, owner of Rice Music House of Columbia, S.C., a Steinway partner in the region since 1924, his wife, Mary, and Losby were present for the celebration.

Matsuo joined the Coker College faculty in 2009 as a visiting assistant professor of music, teaching piano and music theory.

She is versatile as both a solo and collaborative performer. In addition to South Carolina, she has appeared as a guest pianist in New York, Maine, Florida, North Carolina and Texas. Her international activities have included a recital and lecture at the Universitii Sains Malaysia in Penang, Malaysia; performances of Spanish and South American Music for Cello and Piano in Japan; and master classes with Dominique Merlet, Pascal Devoyon, Noel Lee, and Roy Howat at the French Piano Institute in Paris, France. She also recently presented a lecture on Carl Czerny at the World Piano Conference in Novi Sad, Serbia. 

Matsuo earned her Doctor of Musical Arts in piano pedagogy from the University of South Carolina, and prior degrees from Binghamton University and the State University of New York at Plattsburgh.

Matsuo’s teachers include Nanako Tamaki, Kathryn Stuart, Peter Takacs, Walter Ponce and Charles Fugo as well as Diane Richardson and John Keene in collaborative study. 

Matsuo and cellist Richard Thomas will perform a recital, which is free and open to the public, at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 5 in the Hannah Lide Coker Recital Hall.

For more information about music programs at Coker College, please contact Carswell at 843-383-8063 or wcarswell@coker.edu.