Lifetime Achievement Award

The 2005 National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy honors Dr. Nelita True for her incomparable service to our profession. Thousands of piano teachers and students in the USA and around the world have been profoundly impacted by her teaching, her workshop presentations, and her artistry. On Saturday afternoon, the closing session of our conference will honor Nelita True with the NCKP Lifetime Achievement Award, celebrate her gifts to our profession, and express our gratitude for the many ways in which she has influenced our lives as piano teachers.

Nelita True made her debut at age seventeen with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and her New York debut in Avery Fisher Hall with the Juilliard Orchestra. Her career has taken her to the major cities of Western and Eastern Europe, Indonesia, Korea, Japan, Mexico, Iceland, New Zealand, Brazil, Australia, Canada, Singapore, and Hong Kong, as well as to virtually every state in America. She has been a visiting professor at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in Russia, performing and conducting master classes, and has been in the People's Republic of China twelve times for recitals and master classes. She has judged numerous competitions, including the China International (Beijing), Queen Sonja (Oslo), Kapell and Bachauer (USA), Concours de Musique (Canada), PTNA (Tokyo), Horowitz (Kiev), and Lev Vlassenko (Australia). Many of her students have won top prizes at national and international competitions, including an unprecedented five first prizes in MTNA national competitions. Her former students are pursuing careers in performance and as teachers at major conservatories and universities in the United States and abroad. Dr. True is currently Professor of Piano at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York.