Professional piano and music education in a creative environment.
Changing the world one key at a time.
Student Recording Spotlight
All Penny Lazarus Piano Studio students have personal, password-protected, webpages hosting their recordings. Like a diary but with sound, these web pages provide students with a history of their accomplishments as they grow as musicians. By continuing to record every month in the studio, students practice being comfortable playing for others, since recording is a performing experience. These student recordings were selected from our 2024 Koyaanisqatsi Silent Movie Project and our end-of-year showcase recital titled “A River Runs Through Us: A History of the Merrimack River told through music, featuring Latin-X, Asian, and Native American compositions.
Below are excerpts from our Winter Recital titled “We Share One Sky,” featuring winter music about the stars and moon, during the winter solstice. We are very conscious of the detrimental effects of light pollution on wintering birds and animals.
Mia, 2022
When you are a part of the PLPS Community, each student will have their own webpage. Their page will host their recordings, performance videos, and photos of events, recitals, and studio snapshots. Click below to experience PLPS student Mia’s page.
Studio Highlights
In the Studio
Students Speak
Penny Lazarus Piano Studio is made up of 45 students from school-age to adult. Our unusually high retention rate of 90% shows that students truly enjoy their individual private lessons, feeling valued and connected with other students in the studio. Also, our use of studio-wide projects encourages students to make connections between their own playing, the studio, and the world around them.
After the Studio
Alumni Speak
After graduation from high school, students regularly keep in touch with “Teacher Penny”, and they return to visit and support younger students in the studio. Our students have gone on to study music in college and continue to be active in the arts, frequently becoming teachers themselves!
Beyond the Studio
Research, Published Papers,
and Conference Lectures
Penny, a nationally certified teacher of piano, is a skilled conference presenter and writes regularly for music teaching journals. Her presentations and articles are inspired directly by the work students do in the studio, such as practice fundraising projects, using silent movies, discovering historic music by women and BIPOC composers, and connecting with other piano studios around the world.
Students use two Baldwin baby grand pianos. We use high-quality recording equipment to create a permanent record of their music that the students can access on their own individual password-protected recording pages. Professional microphones and video equipment allow us to offer online lessons when someone is unable to come to the studio. (In fact, some of our students maintain their lessons even after they have moved out of state.) Our video and recording equipment let me create personalized teaching videos that are sent home to students for the occasionally flipped lesson format. We use my MacBook Pro, two screens, and iPads to take advantage of music apps, theory games, and YouTube video samples.
“It is a joy to attend Penny Lazarus’ recitals. The talent and creativity she elicits from her students are remarkable. I learn something new each time about composers and learn about others, especially female composers and composers of color, I didn’t know existed. Penny is a nonpareil music teacher. A true gem.”
patterns. discoveries. connections.
Working together.
There are many ways that students in the studio interact and mentor each other. Along with weekly individual lessons, monthly small group workshops called mini-recitals are offered. This is where students play for each other in “student only” groups or work together in music projects or visit with inspiring professionals. In this photo, Theo and Henry are working together on a composition during a composing workshop with Berklee College of Music Professor Eleanor Aversa.
Community.
PLS is well connected with the Greater Newburyport area. Here, Mia and Sam attended an intimate piano recital hosted by The Newburyport Chamber Music Society and worked with professional pianist Michael Brown that morning in a group-friendly masterclass.
“When your child takes lessons with Penny, not only do they experience learning the piano—they experience the essence and the core of music and community.”
— Laura Viola Maccarone, Mom to students Maxwell (12) & Grayson (8)