We congratulate CMS adult piano student Jacqueline Ott-Tran on starting her first part-time job as a professional pianist! Jacqueline is excited to play the piano for church services on the first and third Sundays of each month at St. Luke Evangelical Lutheran Church in Ferndale, PA.
Jacqueline is a 2019 graduate of Penn State University, where she earned Bachelor of Science degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. She works full-time as a Software Engineer for American Express, but piano is her true passion. Jacqueline says, “because I’m a software engineer with a background in tech, instead of piano, that makes this job so important to me. Programming isn’t my passion, but it allows me to pursue my hobbies – Dance Dance Revolution, drawing, and piano.”
Jacqueline began taking piano lessons about four years ago and has been studying with Kelly Hooper here at CMS for a little over a year. “Even though I did not devote my life to piano, it is truly my passion now. Because I started learning piano so late, I have a lot of imposter syndrome.” Over the last year, Jacqueline has worked with Kelly to overcome those negative feelings and has given extraordinary piano performances at numerous CMS recitals and in the community, with other CMS students at Art in the Park, Young at Art, and at our monthly residency at Kirkland Village in Bethlehem.
Come see Jacqueline perform Debussy’s Clair De Lune at the Faculty-Student Recital this Sunday!