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Category: Blind Teachers

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Braille Music Transcriber and Renaissance Woman: Karen Gearreald, Part 1

Posted by: Donna Koh

Part 1 Karen Gearreald has been an NLS patron since 1951, and when the Music Section was established in 1962, she enrolled for music services. She currently serves as a braille music advisor and instructor for the Library of Congress (LOC) Braille Music Transcription Certification program. While I initially contacted Karen to interview her about her …

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American Composers and Musicians from A to Z: B (Part 2 – Bischoff, John W.)

Posted by: Katie Rodda

John Bischoff was an American composer and organist who worked at the First Congregational Church in Washington, D.C. from 1874 until his death in 1909. Blind since the age of two, Bischoff attended the Wisconsin School for the Blind and later studied singing and organ before moving to Washington, D.C. His obituary from the May …

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Aiming Beyond Graduation: Creating Inclusive College Music Courses for Blind and Visually Impaired Students, Part 1

Posted by: Donna Koh

Part 1 The end goal for most college music students is to develop and cultivate skills to prepare for a successful musical career after graduation. For some music students with visual impairment (V.I.), just getting through the college degree program can be challenging.  Here are some common reasons: inability to learn a large amount of …

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Discussing Braille Music with Lifetime NLS Patron Linn Sorge, Part 1

Posted by: Donna Koh

Linn Sorge has been a NLS patron since she was in kindergarten some 60 years ago. I met Linn when I took “Braille Music Basics,” an excellent introductory online course to reading braille music offered through Hadley Institute for the Blind and Visually Impaired.  In addition to being a teacher at Hadley, Linn is an …

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Thinking About Learning Braille Music? Part II

Posted by: Donna Koh

Continued from last week While Bettye Krolick’s How to Read Braille Music: An Introduction is suitable for students who already know the basics of music and only need to learn how to decipher braille music symbols, Richard Taesch’s An Introduction to Music for the Blind Student is suitable for students who are just starting their …

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Liessens Music Writer, Part 2

Posted by: Donna Koh

Continued from last week August Liessens was born in 1894 in Ninove, Belgium. When he was seven years old, he enrolled at the local school for the blind, headed by the Brothers of Charity (Frères de la Charité).  Following that, Liessens was admitted to Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelle, a music school that boasts such famous faculty …

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An Interview with Stephanie Pieck, Part 2

Posted by: Donna Koh

This is the second part of my interview with Stephanie Pieck. Q) Explaining your teaching philosophy, you wrote, “I faced many instances in which the general opinion was that a blind person couldn’t learn. But I also had many very dedicated teachers who knew this wasn’t true; all that was needed was a different way to …