Dr. Paul Wirth
Camp Artistic Director PAUL WIRTH is a prominent figure in our national piano teaching community.  His unique combination of masterful teaching, performing, and sense of humor has produced remarkable results in his specialty of working with pre-college age students.  With his BM from Temple University, and his MM and DM degrees in Piano Performance from Indiana University, Dr. Wirth co-founded and is the Artistic Director of the Wirth Center for the Performing Arts (formerly Central Minnesota Music School) based in St. Cloud, MN.  He has been the featured speaker at local, regional, and national organizations.  His students have been first-prize winners of regional, national, and international competitions and performed over 60 times as soloists with orchestras.  A unique supporter of young performers, he co-founded the Salon se Lève Concert Series in Minneapolis, which awards over $2,000 annually to emerging young artists.

Dr. Jo Anne Link
Pianist JO ANNE LINK has appeared extensively as soloist, duo-pianist, and chamber musician throughout the Midwest and Southwest. She has appeared as soloist with the Maple Mount Festival Orchestra, the Jordan Conservatory Orchestra, and has toured as soloist with the University of Arizona Orchestra. Her teachers have included the Rudolph Ganz pupil and master teacher, Martin Marks, and the eminent pianist, Lee Luvisi (pupil of Rudolph Serkin and Mieczyslav Horszowski). Among the many awards received by her students are the following: Winner-MTNA National Baldwin Awards-State Division and 1st and 2nd place in the International Recording Competition of Austin, Texas. Dr. Link lives in St. Paul with her husband, Dr. Joseph Zins, where they share a studio devoted to the training of gifted and talented young musicians.

Dr. Juan Li
Born into a musical family, Juan Li started learning piano at the age of 5. By age 7, she won the First Young Artist Competition in her home state, Hubei (China), beginning 13 years of study at Shanghai Conservatory of Music. In 1998, she immigrated to the United States on full scholarship at the University of Notre Dame to pursue her MM in Piano Performance, followed by the DMA in Piano Performance at the University of Minnesota, studying under Alexander Braginsky.  Awards include first prizes in the Mozart Piano Competition (Shanghai, China), the Schubert Club Competition (Minnesota), the Elinor Bell Competition and Fellowship (Minnesota), and the University of Notre Dame’s Concerto Competition (Indiana). 
Dr. Li is an active performer, her most recent appearances including the BRAVO! Festival (University of Minnesota); the Cello, an American Experience (International Cello Camp, St. Olaf College) and a concert tour in southern China.  She has soloed with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra (Shanghai, China); City Orchestra, and Bethel University Orchestra (St. Paul, MN); Brentwood Symphony (St. Louis, MO), Notre Dame Symphony (Indiana) and Auburn Symphony (California).  In April 2005, her Mozart Piano Concerto K488 with the Auburn Symphony was praised as “exquisite and exhilarating,” and her Rachmaninoff 2nd Concerto with the City Orchestra in 2003 received tremendous public acclaim.  Dr. Li regularly performs for the Schubert Club Courtroom Concert Series at the Landmark Center in St. Paul. In 2005, her interview/performance on Free Radio Asia from Washington, D.C was broadcast throughout the US and China. She also was chosen as a teacher/performer for the Piano Texas/Cliburn International Institute and Festival in Fort Worth Texas.  A dedicated chamber musician, Dr. Li attended the Aspen Music Festival and the Pacific Music Festival in Japan as one of eight pianists selected from around the world. In 2005, Juan Li joined the piano faculty at Bethel University.

Luke Norell
A native of rural Minnesota, Luke Norell has concertized internationally as soloist and chamber musician. He recently performed as a semi-finalist at the 2012 Panama International Piano Competition, and presented a lecture recital on Bach’s French Overture at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. He also performs frequently with his wife Mary Rose as the Norell Piano Duo. Luke has appeared in collaboration with the Artaria String Quartet, as well as having attended the Webster University Chamber Music Vienna festival, performing at the Universität für Musik in Vienna.

As soloist with orchestra, Norell performed the Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 4 at IU, and made his orchestral debut in 2001 with the Southwest Minnesota Orchestra. His prizes include first place awards in the Schubert Club Competition, the Northwestern College Concerto Competition, and the Third Biennial Lee Piano Competition.

An active teacher, Luke maintains a successful private studio and serves on the faculty of the Young Artist World Piano Festival and the Northwestern College Piano Institute. He was the Accompanying Coordinator for the Indiana University piano department for two years, and held an Associate Instructor position there for five years, teaching both private lessons and group piano classes.

Dr. Daniel Rieppel
DANIEL RIEPPEL, a native Minnesotan of Austrian descent, holds performance degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music, Indiana University, and a DMA from the University of Minnesota. In 1990, Dr. Rieppel made his Ordway debut recital which was broadcast by MPR, and since has performed throughout the United States, Germany, Austria, England, and the Republic of Panama both on his own and as a soloist with several orchestras. He has worked often as a chamber musician with members of both the
Minnesota Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and recently founded the Schubert Trio, of which he is a member. In 1998, Dr. Rieppel joined the faculty of Southwest State University. He divides his time between the Twin Cities and Marshall, where he lives with his wife, Panamanian harpsichordist Julieta Alvarado, and their two children.

Dr. Sean Schulze
Sean Schulze is on the piano faculty of the Cleveland Institute of Music where he teaches piano pedagogy and piano literature to conservatory graduate and undergraduate students and serves as Chair of CIM’s nationally recognized Preparatory Piano Department. After receiving his early training in South Africa where he studied with two of that country’s most renowned pedagogues, Moira Birks and Isabella Stengel, he was invited to pursue a Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Arizona on full scholarship where he studied with Nicholas Zumbro (a student of the famed Rosina Lhévinne). He undertook further studies with Brazilian pianist Caio Pagano and has performed in masterclasses for many of today’s leading pianists and pedagogues including Yoheved Kaplinsky, Bela Siki, Nelita True, John Owings, Martin Canin, Tamás Ungár, and Joseph Banowetz. He has appeared as a concerto soloist with many orchestras – the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra (twice), the Cape Town Symphony Orchestra, The Natal Philharmonic Orchestra, The University of Arizona Symphony Orchestra, the Suburban Symphony Orchestra and the Eastern Arizona Symphony Orchestra – and has performed as a solo and chamber musician throughout Ohio and the US. A sought-after teacher, adjudicator and clinician, Sean Schulze’s students have performed as concerto soloists with various orchestras and continue to win prizes regularly in competitions throughout the United States. In 2008, Schulze founded and continues to direct Summer Sonata, an intensive two-week program of lessons and masterclasses for talented pianists aged 10-18 which takes place annually on the CIM campus.

Dr. Joseph Zins
As winner of the prestigious Young Pianist Competition of the Indiana State Symphony Society, pianist JOSEPH ZINS made his professional debut to critical acclaim at the age of seventeen with the Indianapolis Symphony.  In addition to 15 subsequent solo appearances with the ISO before the age of twenty-two, he has also appeared as soloist with many other orchestras and concertized widely as soloist, duo-pianist and chamber player in works ranging from Bach to Messiaen. Joseph’s musical heritage is an eclectic mix of the Russian, French, and German Schools. His students have excelled in local, state, and national competitions, and have appeared on NPR’s program From the Top and Music da camera. Dr. Zins was named Thursday Musical’s Teacher of the Year, 2003-2004.