Scott Price, Center president, to accept national award
Dr. Scott Price knows how music can connect with and help children with special needs. He’s a leader in the field. Professor of piano and piano pedagogy at the University of South Carolina School of Music, Price currently serves as the president of the board of trustees of The Frances Clark Center for Keyboard Pedagogy – a position he has held for six years. The Center is the hub for piano teaching information in the United States, and Price is only the second president in the Center’s 18-year history. He follows the eminent pedagogue Marvin Blickenstaff, and has just been elected to a third term. Price’s work at UofSC and through The Frances Clark Center for Keyboard Pedagogy has led the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) to shine a light on the importance of music education for special needs children nationally as a result.
So it is fitting that the Center was the recipient of the 2018 Music Teachers National Association Achievement Award, MTNA’s highest honor conferred by the MTNA board of directors to individuals and organizations that have made significant and lasting contributions to music and music teaching. The Frances Clark Center is only the third organization to ever receive this award. The first was the Baldwin Piano and Organ Company in 1990, and the second was the MusicLink Foundation in 2017. Past individual recipients include Van Cliburn, Dave Brubeck, Leon Fleischer, Ross Lee Finney, Henry Steinway, William Bolcom, and Joan Morris, among others. The award is being presented during the MTNA National Conference in Orlando, Florida on March 21.
As the Center’s president, Price serves to guide the organization in development endeavors, hiring, supervision of division directors including the New School for Music Study, and the Clavier Companion Magazine and website. He also serves on the organizing and planning committee for the biennial National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy.
Price is the creator and editor-in-chief for the only online academic journal in the discipline of piano pedagogy, The Piano Pedagogy Forum, which received the 2008 MTNA Frances Clark Keyboard Pedagogy Award, and co-author of the Inclusive Piano Teaching blog devoted to providing teachers with information on teaching students with autism and other special needs.
Price’s work with students with autism has been featured on national television (Dateline NBC) and at the national conventions of MTNA and the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy (NCKP).