You’re listening to Episode 171 of The Piano Pantry Podcast. I’m your host, Amy Chaplin.
If you’ve been around for a while, you may have noticed a slight shift recently. While this podcast is mostly solo, I’ve been sharing a few more interviews than usual. I like to do Teacher Chats every five episodes, but now and then, when a conversation feels more topic-focused, I’ve started giving it its own full episode. That way, Teacher Chats can remain what they’re meant to be—casual, get-to-know-you conversations. It’s just a fun way to mix things up while still staying true to the heart of the show.
Today’s guest is Dr. Kevin Chance, President of Music Teachers National Association for the 2025–2027 term. I especially wanted to have him on because MTNA will be celebrating its 150th anniversary at the March 2026 conference in Chicago, Illinois. You’ll hear some fascinating background on the history of MTNA—including a surprising fact about who actually started the organization—and, as always, you’ll find inspiration for practical and sustainable rhythms in your studio teacher life.
If you’re enjoying this podcast, I invite you to join me on Patreon, where you’ll be teaming up with other teachers to keep this work going and ad-free. Plus, you’ll even have the option to receive a few extras from me as a thank-you for your support. A special thanks today to Sarah Ord for being part of that Patreon crew. Join us at PianoPantry.com/patreon.
Amy:
Kevin, welcome to the Piano Pantry podcast. I’m so excited to have you here to share with our listeners today. Would you mind just introducing yourself and give us a little brief background?
Kevin:
Sure. Thanks so much for having me. I really appreciate the opportunity to chat with you today.
And to all your listeners, I’m Kevin Chance. I am an associate professor of piano at the University of Alabama, where I teach undergraduate through doctoral students, but I also maintain a pre-college studio. I always keep about 12 pre-college students, and currently, my youngest is five, and my oldest is a senior in high school.
I really try to embrace the full gamut of teaching in my career, and I love working with the little ones, especially. I think it’s perhaps a bit rare for someone in academia who also wants to stay connected at the pre-college level but I feel like it’s incredibly important for my teaching to do that. And I’m also the current president of MTNA as of March 2025.
Amy:
So, you teach both collegiate and pre-college levels, and, as you said, that’s very rare. Have you always done that, or is that something that you started later on in your career because you realized that it may have helped you teach better at the collegiate level, or what was that like?
Kevin:
I’ve always done it because I’ve always been able to identify first, as a teacher, and as I was finishing my doctorate, I actually turned down two college positions to take a job at the Alabama School of Fine Arts, which was an arts high school funded by the state of Alabama, and I absolutely loved my students there. I had such a great time teaching. I had incredibly talented kids, but they limited my studio size to 6-8 students max, and I just wanted to feel like I had more impact than that. That’s what ultimately led me to decide to take the position at the University of Alabama, where I could expand the teaching I was doing.
Amy:
I think that’s really brilliant to be able to get to experience it from both ends.
So there are actually two reasons that I’ve invited you onto the podcast. First, I’ve enjoyed featuring interviews with each MTNA President as a recurring segment every couple of years. It actually started somewhat by accident. Karen Thickstun, who served as president from 2021 to 2023, is a friend and colleague from Indiana. So she ended up being my second guest on the podcast, way back, in episode 10, four years ago. And I hadn’t actually planned to make it a regular thing again, but then Peter Mack was president after that and I had met Peter several times, and of course, he’s so delightful to talk to. So I invited him on leading up to the 2024 conference in Atlanta. And then voila, I realized it’s a thing.
So could you give us a little bit more background on what your actual day-to-day work life looks like?
Kevin:
Absolutely. Currently, I’m on sabbatical. So I delayed a sabbatical leave from the university for two years once I won the election, because I really felt like having my first full semester as president would hopefully help me create a teaching schedule for the next three semesters.
So that my students have minimal disruptions because I really hate having to move lessons around. I know people like their routines and schedules, and I do too. I’m hoping that this will pay off in the long run, and I think it will.
However, I am not a morning person. I’ve always been a night owl. My parents have said I fought sleep since the time I was born, so I really feel sorry for them for the first few years of my life, and I feel like I owe them tremendously for putting up with me because I also practicing late at night when they’re ready to go to bed.
So, my day typically starts with a lot of coffee, and I normally start teaching around 10:00 or 11:00. And during the lunch hour, I go to the gym, ’cause that’s my sanity. I feel like I need to move, I need to really do something for my body. I’m never gonna be all that strong. I’m never gonna be all that fast but I want to move because it’s my—it’s how I keep my sanity, really.
I shower at the gym, grab a quick bite, and then return to teach from about 1:00 until 4:00 PM. After that, I finish with my college students for the day and transition to pre-college, typically teaching between 4:00 and 7:00 PM with my pre-college students.
I also have a church job, and I’m in the choir because I truly love church music, which has been a part of my life since I was a child. So I’ve tried to quit three times I think, from this particular position. And I keep getting begged back, and I keep going back with just a minor twisted my arm because I do love the opportunity to get to make music with people who just are there because they love to sing. And I know nothing about directing a choir, but I have certainly played for many choirs over the years. So they get the advantage of whatever I’ve learned indirectly from choir directors over the course of my life.
I currently am teaching six days a week. I teach Sunday afternoons after church because I have a number of students who drive in from around the state. And I really want to phase that out in the next few years, ‘cause that’s getting to be a lot, ’cause I’m no longer 20. So as I’m approaching middle age and embracing middle age, I also wanna embrace my downtime.
Amy:
I have three things I took away from that.
One. You’re really aware of balance in life, or people like to call it blend or whatever. Yes. Being very intentional about when you knew you were going to be taking on the MTNA presidency. Trying to take that, you said sabbatical, like at the beginning, so that you could transition well and not have to make a lot of schedule changes. I love that.
And the second thing. Being aware again that you’re not a morning person and balancing your schedule so that you can have a work schedule that works for your mental capacity, basically, when you’re most vibrant.
Kevin:
Absolutely, and people ask me all the time how I do all I do, and the only way I really know to answer them is I just do it.
But I think the truth is. I try to live with intention, so I do try to be very proactive about thinking about what’s coming as I still perform a lot, so as if I’m preparing solo recitals and chamber recitals and all the different things I have going on, I just always have to be projecting about six weeks in advance so that I can plan my days and schedule my days in a way that I don’t feel frantic because what I’ve noticed about myself is if I let myself get into that frantic mode, now I don’t thrive.
20 years ago, I loved being in panic mode, but I’m now 48, and I would say since I’ve turned 40 each successive year, I’m finding I need a little less frantic and I need a little bit more intention and direction with how I’m planning my days.
Amy:
This is like a good counseling session for teachers on scheduling. LOL
So how does one become the President of Music Teachers National Association? I don’t think anybody makes it a goal of theirs in life to do that. It just happens naturally. So what did that path look like for you?
Kevin:
It was far from linear, and if you had asked me 20 years ago when I was first starting my career out of my DMA. I wouldn’t have even been on my radar, but it happens to many of us. I grew up in Alabama. I grew up maybe 30 minutes outside of Birmingham, and I was very active in all the Alabama music teachers’ auditions growing up.
So I knew everybody in the state. I said I would never come back ’cause I wanted to move as far away from home as possible. And then I did my doctorate at the Eastman School of Music in New York, and lived in Rochester. Completely dissolved me of any idea of not wanting to go home because I wanted to go back to green and sun and hills because I really miss the terrain and the beauty of the green trees and the green grass, and having a limited winter season.
But as soon as I moved home to start my first job, I might have been teaching two weeks before the phone rang and someone from AMTA – Alabama Music Teachers asked me if I would become membership chair. I said “yeah, sure, fine.” I was happy to do it. I figured I’d figure it out as I went, and maybe a month later, about the time I’d wrapped my head around doing membership, they called and said, actually, would you be the President Elect? Because of course nobody would say yes, and I was young and naive and I had no idea what I was saying yes to.
So I agreed to do it. And my first job was planning two conferences as I think most people have to do in those President-Elect positions and it nearly killed me because I knew nothing about using Publisher. I knew nothing about publishing. And of course, I had to do the whole booklet by myself. I was totally in over my head.
But I just tried to go day to day, and in the end, both conferences went well. I enjoyed being President, and I especially enjoyed the Leadership Summit that MTNA puts on for the State Presidents. At the time when I was president, I only had the advantage of one of them because it was during the recession in the late two thousands.
So to save money, they canceled it for one year. So unfortunately, that affected one of my years as President, but. I felt like that gave mine a little more confidence with how to move forward in the role. And once I finished my presidency, I became involved in the Southern Division competitions, which MTNA hosts at the state, regional, and national levels. And I had grown up doing those as well.
The reason I’ve never hesitated to say yes is because I recognize people did this, all of these jobs, when I was a student. And it was all of these opportunities for competitions, for festivals, for recitals, for professional development, even at our state conference, where I got to play frequently growing up, that kept me motivated.
It’s the reason I’m here and if the time I spend in these volunteer roles in some way has a positive impact on any future musicians, then the time, energy, and difficult times we’ve all experienced are worth it. Because I think we all have to be investing in the future of young musicians.
And for me, this is the best way I, beyond my teaching, the best way I know how to do it. And a lot of people have asked me why in the world I would wanna be national president. And the only thing I know to say is that I can help us find a way forward. Because we all know in a post pandemic world, our teaching has changed. The needs of our students are changing and our needs as teachers are changing. If I can have a positive impact on that, it’s all been worth it.
Amy:
So the second reason that I wanted to have you on, besides just being MTNA President, is that the 2026 conference in Chicago is a pretty special one as MTNA is celebrating 150 years. So that means MTNA started in 1875, is my calculation correct?…. Or 1876??
Kevin:
Amy:
So can you tell us a little bit about the history of Mt NA and just how it’s evolved and changed in the past 150 years?
Kevin:
I am by no means an expert on MTNA history, and there is a history that has been written. I think it was written for one of our last big anniversaries, maybe the. 125 and it is about as interesting a read as the Starbucks cup that I have sitting beside me where my name is misspelled. LOL
But I will say that we started on December 26th, 1876. We were officially started by Theodore Presser and William H. Dana. They came together, but the concept for MTNA came from a group of students. It was a group of students at East Greenwich Seminary, as I remember, who approached Theodore Presser with this idea to have an organization to support teachers.
And Presser had been traveling a lot, and he was. I think the word he used to describe the state of music education was deplorable, and the reason it was deplorable was not because the teachers were so terrible. It was simply because there had been a huge economic crisis in the early 1870s, and it was still being felt, and just as it happens currently, people had started teaching to make extra money. So rather than look down on these teachers that he viewed as deplorable, he wanted to find ways to support them. And I feel I’m so grateful that he chose to go the route of a professional organization.
And the other thing that really sits on my heart is that people from eight states, I can’t remember all of them, but I think it was Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, and…I should stop because I’m not gonna get them all…but basically that area of the country…they all traveled to Ohio during the holidays. I just can’t imagine the effort it would’ve taken, and I think it was in over 60 people. 60 people from these different states traveled to Ohio to meet and form MTNA.
So not only did they make it there, they spent three days, they developed a constitution, they elected our first president, who was I from Massachusetts. And the fact that this was all accomplished. over the holiday season absolutely blows my mind. The effort it took, the commitment it obviously showed from them for what they felt this was, that this was an important thing moving forward really inspires me.
And the other thing that has inspired me thinking through the anniversary is not only how we started. In a way that took a lot of effort and commitment and intention, but we’ve also survived two World Wars, Vietnam, Civil Rights Movement, the Great Depression, and it’s amazing to me that we, MTNA and music teaching have continued to thrive even during some of the most difficult times in history.
Amy:
That’s also interesting, especially I love the fact that the organization was started by the students, the people that it ultimately affects. So many cool things there, and I’d love to even dig into MTNA history a little bit more myself. Maybe they’ll have something at the conference that we can all read about. That would be really cool.
Kevin:
We’re going to have some physical displays. Also, if you’re interested, we’re about to get a new website, so hopefully it’ll be easier to find. However, the book published for that last anniversary is now buried on the current website. So if you are interested in an excavation, you’re welcome to dig around and try to find it. LOL I have a feeling that when the new website launches, and I think around Thanksgiving, early December is when we expect to have it, it should be much easier to locate.
Amy:
What is your favorite thing about being an MTNA member?
Kevin:
The people. Without a doubt, as I have learned so much from all of the different members I’ve met over the years, whether in my state or traveling to other states, and I’ve been doing a lot of keynote speeches as president, and one of the things I have said multiple times, and I believe this to the very core of my heart, is every single one of us has something to offer, whether we’re an MTNA member or not.
Whether you have a fancy degree on your wall or whether you don’t, every single music teacher has something to offer students, and I have learned as much from the teachers who would be the first to say, they don’t have the quote fancy degrees as the teachers who studied at the finest conservatories with the finest teachers.
And I think it’s important for all of us to remember we’re in this together and we’re stronger together. And I feel like that’s my favorite thing about MTNA. It’s when I go to the conferences, especially, you’re surrounded by people who share the same passion, the people who share the same commitment, and there is nothing more inspiring to me than that.
Amy:
I feel like we often as teachers, wanna get something for our money and yeah, we wanna get things, but also sometimes it’s just about being apart and about also giving and yes, just, joining in with other teachers and just being together.
Sometimes you think, oh, we’re a small group of people, but I can think of at least half a dozen teachers that I know in my area that I’m pretty sure aren’t MTNA members that are just like you were talking about, like the beginning when the organization was started, that it was, there were a lot of teachers that were just teaching because they needed extra money. It’s like a side job for a lot of people, and not all of those people are members of MTNA.
In the future, I’m hoping that we can rally all the teachers that are out there because there are so many more than those who are already members.
Kevin:
Exactly. And I think something that bothers me is I think a lot of people who are teaching on the side for a little extra income, they often don’t see their own value, but they belong in our fabric just as much as the, the people who have been teaching full time and have had, teaching seven days a week and a hundred kids in their studio are valuable.
Which, again, we are all contributing to this beautiful fabric. For the 150th anniversary, we specifically chose the image of fabric because we’re all these little threads that are creating this beautiful tapestry.
Amy:
That just gave me goosebumps, Kevin.
Kevin:
I think it’s true because even the tiniest thread is holding that garment together. And the same is true for us as an organization, and even beyond the organization, for music teachers. And yeah, you, we, you certainly can get your money’s worth with the discounts and other things that MTNA offers, but it’s that sense of community and it’s that sense of. Belonging to something bigger that I think is really, has meant a lot to me over the years.
Amy:
For really just the cost of what, depending on what your rates are, of course, which we can’t really talk about, but what, a few lessons for the whole year is the cost of MTNA membership?
Kevin:
It depends on state and local dues; it can vary depending on where you live. Yeah. But it’s, the other thing that we’re looking forward to in MTNA is we just finished a membership task force.
We are exploring ways to make membership more affordable, including possible monthly payment options. So there are some things on the horizon that we hope will help make MTNA more accessible because ultimately for the cost of the Starbucks that I picked up before this, you can pretty much pay a month your monthly dues.
So if you really divide what you’re paying over 12 months, it’s fairly affordable. And I think when you see the yearly total, it can be a little bit intimidating, but we are. Actively having discussions right now coming out of this task force. And of course everything takes time. So a lot of these changes may not happen even during my presidency because it just takes time to figure out how to make the software work and how we deal with the local and state levels. But we are very committed to having more options for people.
Amy:
That’s exciting.
So I’ve heard that this is going to be a no holds bar to kind of conference—the one that you attend if you have never been to one and you’re only gonna ever go to one—you should come to this one.
Kevin:
Absolutely.
Amy:
Of course, I hope it lives up to the hype.
Kevin:
I do too.
Amy:
But of course they’re always fantastic, in my opinion. I’m sure you’d agree, but can you just give us a preview of what attendees can expect to experience as part of the celebration?
Kevin:
The first thing I will say, when we did the call for proposals, we received a record high number of proposals. We had over 700 people sending in proposals to present, and we only have room for a small fraction of those. I think all of the sessions will be really interesting. The committee chose a variety of sessions, so we have things that are going to appeal to people who teach beginners, some who teach more advanced students.
We have sessions about wellness, and some sessions about business practices. We really do try to encapsulate the gamut of all we do in our daily lives as music teachers and acknowledge that we all have very different views as music teachers as well. So we hope the programming reflects that.
But beyond the chosen sessions, which will be fantastic, we’ve also chosen who, some guest artists that really excite me. The first are guest artists who will do the first. The recital is by Angela Hewitt, a Canadian pianist. She has recorded the entire output of Bach in her lifetime, and kudos to her for that. No way in my wildest dreams could I ever accomplish that in my lifetime.
Another thing I’m very committed to as President is trying to be more inclusive of other genres of music. Our opening concert will be performed by Jane Monheit, a jazz vocalist. She was one that won the Thelonious Munk competition in the late nineties. I happened upon hearing her in a bar in Rochester on Valentine’s Day in 2004, and it was one of the most magical nights of my life. I think everyone is really in for a treat. She sings a lot of the American songbook, and we’re hoping the theme of that night will be something like MTNA through the decades.
Our keynote speaker is Scott Yu. So during the pandemic, I happened to turn on PBS and caught this show called Now Hear This, and I was absolutely transfixed by the end of the one episode I watched. This host is Scott Yu, who’s a violinist. He lives in Missouri. And to me, he has an insatiable intellectual curiosity. When we talked to him about being the keynote speaker, he said, first of all, I have no idea why you want me. You’re all piano teachers. I said first, we’re not all piano teachers, but I love the fact that even as someone who’s a conductor and a violinist, you still have this wonderful curiosity for everything we do.
We’ll also have master classes presented by Alan Chow, who’s one of my favorite teachers and a dear friend from the Eastman School of Music. He’ll be doing our advanced masterclass.
I wanted a pre-college teacher to do the pre-college masterclass. So I’ve asked Nancy Breath from the Washington DC area to do our intermediate masterclass.
Amy:
I think that’s great. I love the idea of having a pre-college teacher do the intermediate masterclass. And also, one of my favorite concerts in my memory from MTNA was when Time for Three. Yes. It was in San Antonio in 2016, I think and oh my gosh, I just was crazy for it. So I love the idea of having concerts that aren’t just pianists.
So I hear there’s a special discount maybe going on for young professionals that’s going to be offered for the conference. Can you share with us the details on that?
Kevin:
Yes, I am so thrilled and part of our wanting to reach more demographics, and part of us wanting to also embrace the importance of young professionals, but also acknowledging that, as young professionals, you’re probably not having the income that you will have, hopefully, when you get your studio going.
We’re offering members who are under the age of 30, as of March 30th, 2026, the ability to register for $150. We figured $150 for 150, so you’re saving several hundred dollars off the registration fee.
We’ve also had a number of articles written by Karen that we talked about earlier. Karen Thickstun has written some articles that are on the website on how to attend the conference on a budget, ways to save money with food. We save money on hotels, et cetera.
So we really hope a lot of our young professionals will take advantage of this because we want them there, most importantly. But we also want to want them to see how the conference can benefit them in the early stages because I have to say, that’s when I got the absolute most out of attending.
The exhibit hall transformed my life, and I used to bring an extra suitcase for the exhibit hall to bring home music, as, first of all, the discounts are great in the exhibit hall, but also not a lot of us have physical music stores anymore. The brick-and-mortar music stores are harder and harder to find. And it’s always my chance to go hold a book and look at it and see everything in it and see how things are laid out on the page, and I just can’t replace that opportunity every year.
Amy:
Yeah, when I was first teaching, I would’ve benefited so much from that kind of a discount. That’s just huge because I remember skipping a couple, at least of conferences. I know I didn’t go to New York for one, I remember. Just because it’s expensive to go.
And I remember the exact same thing, too, what you were saying about purchasing books. When I was in college, in grad school, I remember it was a conference in Wisconsin, I think not in Madison.
Kevin:
Milwaukee.
Amy:
Milwaukee, thank you. And I, because that’s one of the ones I’ve had to miss. Okay. I remember pulling it, it was a kind of briefcase thing behind you, like a real wide one, like a foot deep, and it was just stacked and packed with books. And I was not staying at the conference hotel and ugh, that was not fun lugging that all around.
Kevin:
Seattle was mine, and a friend of mine, who went to LSU with me, was from Newfoundland. Okay. So she was coming to Seattle because she had family fairly close by. And I think she brought two extra suitcases, and I brought one, and we were still sitting on each other’s suitcases trying to get ’em zipped when we came home, and praying they weren’t overweight. That’s essentially in many ways how we afforded the trip by how much we were saving on a lot of the money, a lot of the music we were buying.
Amy:
So, outside of living the life of a piano teacher, what are some little things or even big things that just bring you joy?
Kevin:
Disney.
Amy:
Oh, really?
Kevin:
I’m a huge Disney fan. I think my phone’s nearby. I’ve got my little Mickey phone case.
Amy:
That’s awesome.
Kevin:
So if I’m not teaching, you’ll probably find me in a Disney Park or on Disney Cruise Line. I especially love cruising, and since I’ve become president, I love cruising even more because it gives me an opportunity to disconnect from email and just be quiet for a few days, but I, to me I’ve always loved the Disney parks, but as an adult, what I love about them is you can see kids smiling and having fun, and then I can go back to my room and also relax and have, wonderful food and wonderful drinks, and I love rollercoasters. So I have a little bit of an adrenaline junkie inside of me who does love a not-so-wild coaster, which Disney fits well with.
Amy:
What’s your favorite park?
Kevin:
Animal kingdom. Animal Kingdom, to me, is just so lush and so beautiful. I love how. The landscaping is gorgeous, and I love Expedition Everest and Flight of Passage. I also love the Festival of the Lion King show.
I think one of the things that keeps me going back to Disney and gives me so much joy is that they hire such great musicians, singers, and actors, and I want to support that. And I’ve had a lot of friends who’ve worked for the company over the years and they’ve all had good things to say about how they were treated as entertainment, and that also makes me want to keep supporting them.
Amy:
I’ve been to Disney, I think, three times. We went with some friends just as couples, my husband and I in 2014, I think. So that was the first time we ever went, and we hit almost all the parks. My favorite, of course, after that was Epcot, because I love food. I love travel. I just love Epcot.
And then, of course, the second time I went was during the MTNA conference at Disney, or in Orlando, and several of our friends went and did a day or an afternoon at Disney. That was really fun.
Kevin:
I might have escaped from the conference more than I should have to go to the parks during that conference.
Amy:
Oh, that’s funny. And then, actually, I think probably before that one, I, for a couple of years when I first started my studio, I was playing as a keyboardist for a show, choir band, and I got to go down with them to Disney to one of the competitions one year.
Kevin, is there anything else that you would like to share with the Piano Pantry podcast listeners?
Kevin:
The one thing I would love to close with is every single one of you are important. Every single one of you are needed. Each of you are a vital part of your communities. And every moment that you’re with a student is meaningful because often so much of what we’re teaching, the impacts are not gonna be felt by the students for many years, but the impact will inevitably be there.
So I just want to encourage everybody to remember that what we do is a very noble profession. It’s a very important profession. And since so much of us teach one-on-one, we don’t hear that enough. But I think we all need to be reminded occasionally of how important the work we’re doing is in the lives of our students, whether they’re five or whether they’re 95.
I think it’s incredible that we have these wonderful communities, and thank you for all you’re doing with the Piano Pantry to help connect people as well.
Amy:
Thank you for all that you’re going to be doing over the next couple of years in advance. I can already see great things coming, and I’ve really enjoyed getting to know you a little bit more. I look forward to seeing you at the conference in March.
Kevin:
Absolutely. It’s so wonderful to be with you, Amy. Thank you again, and I hope to see everybody in Chicago.
Early Bird registration for the conference closes on or before December 15, 2025, so be sure to register soon to take advantage of the discount. And like Kevin mentioned, if you’re a young professional, you can register for just $150, which is AMAZING! I hope you’ll take this opportunity to experience everything a national-level conference has to offer—you won’t regret it!
I’m excited to be doing two new things at the MTNA Conference this year myself. First, while I’ve presented at many national conferences, I think this is the first time I’ve been invited to present a session specifically for the Young Professionals Track. I’ll be participating in a joint session with Davis Dorrough on Monday, March 23, 2026, titled “Blueprint for Success: Running a Thriving 21st-Century Studio.”
I’m also going to have my own little table in the Entrepreneurs’ Corner in the exhibit hall—a space where I can share everything I’ve got going on here with Piano Pantry. I’m excited to see what that experience is like and hope you’ll come by and say hello! I’ll be setting a few specific times when I’ll be at the table in person, so stay tuned for those details.
If you’re new around here, don’t forget to hit the subscribe button in your podcast app so new episodes download automatically. Also, scroll back through the feed and check out episodes #010 and #110 with Peter Mack and Karen Thickstun—both past MTNA Presidents.
See you next time!
