About the Instructor

About the Instructor...

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR MISSION AND PHILOSOPHY MUSICAL FAMILY TREE PICTURES RESOURCES

ROOTS AND METHOD STUDENT APPLICATION TEACHER APPLICATION TESTIMONIALS WHY STUDY MUSIC

Hello, my name is Elina Nostrant. Thank you for visiting my website and taking a few minutes to share in my love for music, primarily classical music. My family and I have recently relocated to Parkville, MD, and I look forward to meeting fellow piano enthusiasts and spreading the joy of piano playing to new students.

I am a professional pianist and a teacher by education and mission. Music is my life and my love. I was born in Baku, USSR to highly educated parents. My father, Dr. Vilen Ter-Arutyunov, PhD, was a brilliant engineer and professor at the Politechnical Institute. In addition to my father's professional career he was also an athlete and a talented musician. He played several instruments and even had his own nonprofessional orchestra. My mother, Julietta Arutyunova, Master of Music in Performance and Pedagogy, gifted pianist, and successful director of a music school in Baku, was my first piano instructor.

I was fortunate to study with the best teachers, talented, and renowned musicians. Among them were, as I previously mentioned. my mother, Julietta Arutyunova, Elmira Nazirova, a gifted, brilliant, inspired pianist and composer, and Gregory Kahachaturov, a talented and highly professional musician,

I started my music education by going to the Music School for Children in Baku, USSR where I studied piano, music theory, music history, ensemble, and chorus according to the Russian style of music education. After graduating the Music School for Children and a Music College par excellence I was accepted to a prestigious State Conservatory in Baku, USSR where I earned a Masters of Music, sum cum laude, in Performance and Pedagogy.

Upon completing my formal education I continued to perform and at the same time obtained a position as an accompanist and teacher at the GITIS in Moscow, USSR. After moving to the United States I was still performing and also started to work as a piano teacher and an accompanist at the D'Angelo School of Music of Mercyhurst College, Neighborhood Art House where I was the coordinator of the music department and my very own Russian School of Music in Erie, Pennsylvania.

I am fiercely dedicated to my students and I am honored to report that the majority of them regularly participated in a variety recitals, auditions, festivals, and are first prize winners of city-wide competitions. Throughout the years I have been a member of various professional organizations including the Music Teachers National Association, Pennsylvania Music Teachers Association, American College of Musicians and Erie Music Teacher's Association in order to maintain my musical education and keep up to date with the latest research.

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR MISSION AND PHILOSOPHY MUSICAL FAMILY TREE PICTURES RESOURCES

ROOTS AND METHOD STUDENT APPLICATION TEACHER APPLICATION TESTIMONIALS WHY STUDY MUSIC