All teachers employed by Music Together first notes have completed teacher training sponsored by the Center for Music and Young Children in Princeton, New Jersey.
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Karen Sloneker, teacher/director, plays second trumpet with the Pittsburgh Ballet and Opera Orchestras. A member of the faculty at the Rogers Middle School for the Arts since 1981, she has also taught music at Carriage House Children’s Center in Squirrel Hill. Karen formerly taught in the Music Department at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and at Seton Hill College. She holds Music Together Certification Level I, Early Childhood Music and Movement Association Certification Level II, and Orff Level One Certification. Karen is currently completing her Pennsylvania Music Education K-12 Certification.
She has been a presenter at the Pittsburgh Association of Educators of Young Children annual conference on two occasions, and has led workshops with early childhood educators on children's musical development. She was a guest presenter at the Greater Pittsburgh Montessori Society last fall. Karen has completed the course work for Music Together Certification Level II, and is working feverishly to complete her Level II project so that she can represent Music Together at conferences.
Karen attended Music Together classes with her children, Ean and Marnie. She is a member of the Music Educators National Conference, Pennsylvania Music Educators Association, National Association of Educators of Young Children, and the Early Childhood Music and Movement Association.
Tania Grubbs, teacher
It is with great pleasure that we welcome Tania and her family back to Pittsburgh after a year's leave. Tania is a veteran Music Together teacher who has been greatly loved by the families she has touched. In addition, Tania has worked with many school aged children in the Pittsburgh area, engaging them and their teachers in a variety of activities in music and the arts. She was an aesthetic educator with Gateway to the Arts, receiving four "Ready for Life" early childhood grants through the Heinz endowment, working as a resident artist and workshop presenter. Tania was the music specialist at Shady Lane Preschool for three years.
As an accomplished vocalist, Tania spent two seasons with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra kicking and singing next to Fiddlesticks the Frisky Cat. She performed as a soloist on the Center for Creative Play's first CD, "Time to Sing."
Tania holds a BFA in Musical Theater from Youngstown State University and did her aesthetic education training at the Lincoln Center Institute in New York. Her beautiful children Zoe, Olivia, and Harrison brought her to Music Together.
Jennifer Russell, teacher
As a vocalist and mother of 2 young children, Jennifer understands and appreciates the value of music and movement in the lives of children and their families. Jennifer has been singing since she was a child. Throughout junior high and high school, she performed as a soloist and participated in choirs and music festivals across Pennsylvania and the eastern United States. During college, she performed as a member of and soloist for the college choir and chamber singers and in the college’s production of “Hello, Dolly!”. After college, she continued her education, earning her law degree from Duquesne University School of Law, and has been a practicing attorney for over 10 years. Jennifer has been a member of the Bach Choir of Pittsburgh and has sung as both a soloist and member of the choir at the First Presbyterian Church of Bakerstown. Most recently, after singing for weddings for over 20 years, Jennifer has started her own company, Ovation Special Events, offering her services as a ceremony vocalist and music planner for wedding ceremonies and receptions.
Jennifer began attending Karen’s Music Together classes in 2004 with her daughter, Nora, when she was a toddler. When little brother, Owen, came along, he joined them, too! Now Daddy also comes to share in the fun. Jennifer and her family immediately fell in love with the program and Jennifer decided to become a Music Together teacher so that she can share her love of music with other children and their families.
Junghyae Lee, teacher
Junghyae comes to Music Together as an interested and involved musical parent. As a high school student in Korea, she won a solo vocal contest and worked in her school’s radio broadcasting station. That experience exposed her to a wide variety of music genres and fostered her growing love of music. Following high school, Junghyae went on to one of the best schools in Korea, where she ultimately completed a master’s degree in sociology with an emphasis on culture and society. Following that, she worked in research.
When her husband’s work brought them to Pittsburgh, the Lee family enrolled in Music Together with their first child, Christopher. The program’s philosophy, coupled with the experience of being in a new culture with different views of children and learning, affected Junghyae tremendously. She says that she was especially taken with Music Together’s philosophy that “all children are musical.” The challenge, she says, is “how well we can lead them to express themselves and to develop musically. The family involvement in Music Together classes continues with Jocelyn, who, like her brother, loves to sing and move to music.
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