Bucyrus Piano Teacher celebrates five decades of teaching

Five Decades of Piano Teaching in Bucyrus

BUCYRUS—Mrs. Donna Kurtz has been teaching piano lessons in Bucyrus since 1969. Recently the question was posed to her: How many students has she had in 53 years of teaching in Bucyrus?

She took a moment to ponder this and, with a light laugh, said, “Oh, I have no idea!”

It is not outside the realm of possibility that her former and present piano students number in the hundreds. At one time, she was teaching 31 students, which is the most she had ever had at once. Currently, she has 13 students, and she is now seeing second-generation students coming through her studio. 

Kurtz is a woman of many talents. Not only is she a wife, mother, grandmother, singer, a trained pianist, and flautist, but she also compiled a hymnal entitled “My Lips Shall Praise Thee” in 1976. During our interview in her cozy library, she rose to her feet to take two copies of the hymnal off of a bookshelf. It is no surprise that a woman who has dedicated her life to music would also have classical music playing softly in the background of her home and meaningful sayings and Bible verses painted ornately on the walls.

As she handed over a special leatherbound version of her hymnal, she explained, “We had a typewriter that we borrowed from someone that actually typed the music.” This is quite a feat, given this hymnal was compiled long before computers and the internet, and she paused when asked how she conquered such a project. “At the dining room table!” she said with a laugh.

Where It All Began

Her love of music started young. As an only child growing up outside of Chicago, Illinois, she was immersed into music from the very beginning. “My parents were singers on WLS in Chicago for many years. I was in a musical family,” she said. Her parents were dedicated in finding her the very best piano teacher. By the age of 17, she made her debut at the Orchestra Hall in Chicago under the direction of Conductor Desire Defauw. The piece she played was Weber Konzerstück in F Minor by Carl Maria von Weber.

Following in the footsteps of her parents, Kurtz also stepped into a staff musician role as a singer for WMBI Chicago in 1954 – a position her church organist secured for her. “I said I thought that sounded like fun. You were given the music about 10 minutes before you were on the radio. Almost no practice…just be able to sight read,” she recounted. 

After high school, she pursued her Bachelor’s in Music degree from Oberlin Conservatory. It was there that she met John Kurtz. “He said I smiled at him coming out of the treasurer’s office,” she laughed. Within just a few days, he had tracked her down, and they became inseparable. He was a junior to her sophomore. He then got his medical degree at Johns Hopkins University. During this time, she spent a year in Salzburg, Austria, studying at The Mozarteum, teaching music, and performing in 300 concerts across Europe with a quartet. She returned to the United States and earned her master’s degree in music at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore.

Moving to Crawford County

After they were married, they lived in Columbus for a short time as John took his medical residency and fellowship training in hematology at The Ohio State University. His family had roots in Crawford County, so they decided to move to Bucyrus. Along with raising their four children there, he practiced internal medicine, hematology, and oncology, and she built her music studio. Kurtz is not sure when she decided to pursue music as an occupation. “I don’t think there was ever a conscious decision that I was going to be a piano teacher,” she said. It is just part of who she is.

Kurtz’s Music Studio Success

Over the years, Kurtz’s students have gone on to have many musical achievements along with over $1.1 million in college music scholarships. She is involved with the Royal Conservatory of Music, Toronto as a Legacy Examiner, Ohio Music Teachers Association as a Permanently Certified Teacher, Ohio Federation of Music Clubs as an Adjudicator, and judge for the National Guild of Piano Teachers. She is also a trained teacher for the Suzuki Association of the Americas.

During her time teaching, Kurtz has also spent a good deal of time playing in concerts – 350 to be exact – over the course of a decade. Her music has taken her all over the world – to Hungary, Romania, Cuba, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Japan, and many more locations.

At the end of our time together, Kurtz showed me where she sees her students. Her studio is a large area with an impressive 7-foot Baldwin grand piano anchored in the middle of the room. At times she has held private recitals there for her students and their families. 

“A special treat has been seeing students who have become piano teachers, composers, arrangers, performers etc. build on what they learned in elementary, junior high and senior high school,” Kurtz said. Above the piano, there is a Swedish saying painted on the wall. It truly embodies Kurtz and her passion for music, teaching, and life itself. Translated to English, it says simply, “Do what you love, and love what you do.”