Marilyn Roth has spent a life in teaching young adults and children, dedicated to nurturing artistry, love of music, and love of the piano.
In 2007, she received the New England Conservatory Preparatory School’s Jean Stackhouse Excellence in Teaching Award. Roth first taught eurhythmics at NEC before joining the Preparatory School’s piano faculty, where she developed the "Sight-reading for Pianists" course. In 1997 she became co-chair of the Preparatory School’s piano department, and has been chair since 2002.
Roth collaborated with NEC colleague A. Ramòn Rivera in directing the 2003 Summer School Pedagogy Institute “Songs without Words,” with guest composer Donald Waxman. With pianist and NEC alumnus Donald Berman '88 M.M., she co-directed summer piano institutes on the music of Schumann and Brahms (2006), Chopin (2007), Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn (2008), Clara and Robert Schumann (2010), and Liszt, coming in 2011. Presentations include “Artistic Beginnings” and “Stephen Heller, Kleinemeister.” Roth was invited twice to present at the World Piano Pedagogy Conference, as a member of the Committee on Theories and Learning.
Marilyn Roth teaches a wide range of repertoire, and her class includes young beginners as well as advanced high school students. Her students have performed on NPR’s “From the Top” and have been winners and finalists in the NEC Prep Concerto Competition, New England Piano Teachers’ Association Alice Hamet and Ruth Davidson Competitions, A. Ramòn Rivera Competition, and the Ithaca College Piano Competition for High School Students. After graduating from NEC Prep, Roth’s students have entered Brandeis, Harvard, Johns Hopkins, MIT, Northwestern, Stanford, Tufts, Yale, and the University of Chicago.
Marilyn Roth has led NEC Prep pianists in two performing/learning tours to Europe. In 2006, NEC exchanged visits with students from the Musikschule Margareten of Vienna. In Austria fourteen auditioned students, representing nine studios, performed recitals in Vienna and at the Esterházy Palace in Eisenstadt. In 2008 eleven pianists, auditioned from nine studios, toured Germany and the Czech Republic, performing in Weimar at the Musikschule Ottmar Gerster, and in Leipzig at the Schumann House. At the Mendelssohn House in Leipzig, they played in a masterclass given by Markus Tomás of the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Leipzig. The tour continued with visits to Berlin and Prague. Roth commissioned international artist/architect John Diebboll (author of The Art of the Piano) to design the 2008 Germany Tour T-shirts.
Born in Pittsburgh, Marilyn Roth was the first-prize winner in the Three Rivers Piano Competition and performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. She has performed locally in chamber music and solo recitals at New England Conservatory, University of New Hampshire, University of Massachusetts-Lowell, and other venues.
B.F.A., Carnegie Mellon University; M.M., NEC. Piano studies with Harry Franklin and Victor Rosenbaum; Dalcroze eurhythmics studies with Marta Sanchez, John Colman, Lisa Parker; piano pedagogy with Jean Stackhouse. Also faculty at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; former faculty, University of Massachusetts/Lowell.
photo of Marilyn Roth by Andrew Hurlbut