Marti Bessinger is an active performer and music educator. She holds a Master of Music degree in piano performance from the University of Oklahoma and Bachelors of Music degree in Music Education and Music Therapy from Southwestern Oklahoma State University.
She presently serves as organist and music director at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Statesville. She has accompanied numerous concerts in both piano and organ at the university and high school level as well as professional music theatre throughout her career.
She has been a piano teacher and public school music educator for many years and in addition taught piano and music education classes as an adjunct instructor at Southwestern Oklahoma State University. She recently retired from teaching music at Arts Based School in Winston-Salem. Her passion continues to lie within music education and she teaches early childhood music classes, group and private piano at UNCSA Community Music School.
As a music educator, Marti believes in providing a student with a high level of significant and meaningful experiences as possible. Within these experiences, a teacher must be a facilitator and collaborate with the students to make musical choices. A safe and welcoming environment, one free of harsh or judgmental attitudes, allows a student to blossom and gain confidence. Marti Believes that embracing the diversity and uniqueness of each individual will enable the teacher to draw out the student’s assets and creativity.
Embracing diversity and uniqueness of each individual will enable the teacher to draw out the student’s assets and creativity. In the end, we want students to become productive members of our society. In order for this to happen, we as teachers must reflect high values for our students to model.”
Marti Bessinger