As the Associated Music Teachers League reflects on a century of music education and artistic exchange, we are honored to present a reflection by pianist and teacher Ann Schein — an artist whose life’s work embodies the values at the heart of our League.
Across an extraordinary international career, Ann Schein has inspired generations of musicians through her artistry, her teaching, and her deep commitment to musical tradition. Her words remind us that music is not defined by performance alone, but by a lifelong dialogue between teachers and students — a process through which knowledge, discipline, and humanity are continually passed on.
In the reflection that follows, she weaves together gratitude for her own mentors, devotion to her students, and a belief in music as a sustaining force that connects past, present, and future. Her voice speaks to the continuity that has always shaped AMTL: the conviction that every lesson, every shared moment of music, strengthens the living bridge between generations.
We are grateful to Ann Schein for sharing these thoughts, which stand as both a tribute to the past and an invitation to carry this tradition forward.
© Ann Schein: Recording of the 1st album with works by Rachmaninoff, 1960
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© Ann Schein: Charles Treger, Violinist & Ann Schein with Lady Bird Johnson at the White House, 1963
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© Ann Schein: Jessey Norman (Opera Singer) & Ann Schein, April 2, 1995
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“I am deeply honored to be asked to join in the 100th Anniversary Year celebration of the Associated Music Teachers League of NYC! This gives me a perfect opportunity to give thanks to God and to my parents for my own incomparable and unforgettable teachers, mentors and pianistic guides.
The first of my “gifts” came very quickly in my third year. It was 1941, wartime. Radios were on day and night with war news and plenty of patriotic music. In our house in Evanston, Illinois, a big brown radio, placed in the middle of our dining room table, broadcast the news throughout the house and the uplifting tunes were at blaring volumes. One day, I ran to the piano and pounded out The Marine Hymn with both hands. My violinist mother heard this, and acted quickly. She took me to meet two important pianists and teachers, Glenn Dillard Gunn and his wife, Bessie Bracken Gunn, and they asked me to play them anything i desired. Within a few weeks, they were leaving Chicago for Washington, D.C. where Dr. Gunn had been invited to become the music critic on their leading newspaper, the Times Herald. My parents shared with them the astonishing fact that my father, a lawyer, had already made arrangements for our family to move to Washington where he chose to practice law. I was accepted into Mrs. Gunn’s studio in D.C., where I studied with her from the age of 4 to 13. I played a recital in her studio every year. Our family attended the weekly concerts of the National Symphony and the Sunday afternoon recitals in Constitution Hall regularly. I heard the highest level of artistry in Concerto, recital and chamber music by the finest performers active in the world. I have no words for this life-changing exposure.
Both the American-born Gunns had gone to Berlin to study with Ferrucio Busoni, and had also established their own music school in Chicago before leaving for Washington. I add one small fact to this story, the decision of my amazing parents plus my new teachers: from my kindergarten first year in Evanston and through all of my school life, that I arrive at school two hours late. The first hours of every day were devoted to piano practice. This was handled as a normal routine by both my family and the schools and prevailed through my high school years. My friends had to work around it.
I attended the National Music Camp in Interlochen, Michigan during the summers of 1951 and 1953. Each summer, I entered their competition with a Concerto movement along with students of all ages and varying instruments. I had been given many American works by the Gunns over the years, as they knew and championed the latest and exciting new American composers– including Edward MacDowell. In the summer of 1953, I auditioned with the first movement of the MacDowell d minor Concerto. The next day, winners were announced and the list went up on the wall of the administration office. I saw the unbelievable news that I had had been chosen as the winner of the pianists, and was told that I was the youngest winner in their history. I was stunned. My parents came from Washington to hear the performance, and had been thinking deeply about what this could mean for a next step in my musical development, and of course, with the approval of the Gunns. Auditions were arranged at Juilliard, Curtis and Peabody Conservatory. I played for formidable faculty artist-teachers in each school. At Peabody, I played for Reginald Stewart, the Director at that time and for many years, the conductor of the Toronto Symphony. He said to my mother that day after I played, “I can recommend the perfect teacher for your daughter, a great Polish pianist, Mieczyslaw Munz, who is here today. Would you like to meet him? Ann could play for him!” Across the hall was this incomparable, world-renowned virtuoso, who bowed low to my mother, and kissed her hand. After playing something which I cannot now remember, he accepted me instantly and asked my mother if she would be willing to drive me three times a week to Peabody for two hour lessons early in the mornings before arriving back to my D.C. school. As it turned out, he had also attended the classes in Berlin of Busoni before making his debut in the U.S., and had become his “assistant”, being asked by the Master to play and demonstrate for the other attendees and students! One of my stellar Peabody students, Svetlana Belsky, who came to Peabody from Russia and began teaching in Chicago after her Peabody graduation, has translated a biography of Busoni from a Russian author into English, hopefully available online!
I would like to mention quickly, names of a few other “coaches and encouragers!”– among those who offered their pianistic and life-changing advice coaching me after my Mexico City debut with the Third Concerto of Rachmaninoff during the summer of 1957,: Arthur Rubinstein, Dame Myra Hess, Menahem Pressler, and Beveridge Webster. I realize that each of these divine artist-teachers gave me vast depths of learning and musical guidance that nurtured my exciting teaching life which began in 1980 at Peabody Conservatory– miraculously continuing today at both Mannes-New School in NYC and Peabody. I was on fire to pass on their inspired musical art and HUGE hearts of loving encouragement to my own students, as they had done with me.
There is one more person to mention. After my God-given parents came my God-given husband, Earl Carlyss, violinist and member of the Juilliard String Quartet, and teacher of chamber music at Juilliard and the Aspen Music Festival for over 40 summers- His music and teaching life endured until a few years ago, when he said, one morning, “ I think I will retire this year! I came to Juilliard when I was 17, had the finest violin and music teachers in Paris and Juilliard, and played and taught string Quartets and performed thousands of chamber-music concerts—I’ve had the richest life, and I thank God for each day!” He is, without a slightest doubt, the highest of all the artists in my life, and the finest teacher I have ever known.
Congratulations to the Associated Music Teachers League of NYC in this 100th Anniversary year! My loving wishes go out to each of your teachers as they fill their students with the beauty and truth of great music!”
Ann Schein
© Ann Schein: Ms. Ann Schein teaches at the festival in Aspen, Colorado, 1984
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© Ann Schein: Ms. Ann Schein teaches at the festival in Aspen, Colorado, 1984
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© Ann Schein: Ms. Ann Schein teaches at the festival in Aspen, Colorado, 1984
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