Piano students get expert guidance
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 5 months, 3 weeks AGO
From left: Piano students Kyle and Kaylee Duong with visiting artist Dr. Fabio Menchetti at the Music Artistry Program in Moses Lake in March.
COURTESY PHOTO/WASHINGTON STATE MUSIC TEACHERS ASSOCIATION
Joel Martin has been with the Columbia Basin Herald for more than 25 years in a variety of roles and is the most-tenured employee in the building. Martin is a married father of eight and enjoys spending time with his children and his wife, Christina. He is passionate about the paper’s mission of informing the people of the Columbia Basin because he knows it is important to record the history of the communities the publication serves. | April 22, 2026 3:20 AM
MOSES LAKE — Forty-five Basin piano students participated in the Washington State Music Teachers Association’s Music Artistry Program on March 27-28, according to an announcement from the association.
“The students play two piano pieces, memorized or non-memorized, for the visiting artists,” said music teacher Harriet West, who had students participating in the program. “Then (the artists) write down comments and work with students at the piano.”
The visiting artist was Dr. Fabio Menchetti, according to the announcement. Menchetti, a native of Lucca, Italy, is an assistant professor of piano at Washington State University. Menchetti has performed as a soloist with orchestras in Italy and the U.S., and regularly concertizes throughout the United States, both as a soloist and a chamber musician, according to his website.
“(The teachers like) to have someone else listen to the students, somebody really good, and offer suggestions,” West said. “Our music teachers (association) chapter is really particular whom we invite to come here and work with our students. We want somebody to offer encouragement, be uplifting, reinforce what the teacher has already taught.”
The pieces the students performed are mostly classical, West said, selected by the teacher. The difficulty of the music is at the teacher’s and the student’s discretion. Many students work for a long time to get their pieces down, West said. Kaylee Duong and Kyle Duong teamed up for a duet, she said.
“It was a marvelous, marvelous duet,” West said. “They probably worked four or five months on it.”
The MAP was formerly called “adjudication,” but that term was deemed intimidating to students, West said, so it was renamed to Music Artistry Program. The program has been going on since the Moses Lake-Central Basin chapter of the WSMTA was formed in 1970, West said.
Advice from an outside expert goes a long way to furthering the music students’ education, West said.
“Sometimes it means more to the students than (it would) coming from their teacher,” she said.
Participating students:
Benjamin Faber
Giovanni Pendleton
Eveline Dovmat
Julian Dovmat
Kaylee Duong
Kyle Duong
Alvin Beus
Jacob Beus
Asher Schober
Jonah Schober
Jelani Mann
Kylia Coulston
Anna Borodulin
Isaiah Turchik
Paul Turchik
Bayanna Ismagulov
Joel Carpenter
Evie Trautman
Zoey Chavez
Alec Goleta
Kate Goleta
Sofia Suprunenko
Danny Tormozov
Faith Buchert
Wyatt Gilbert
Ella Gilbert
Sawyer Golay
Rocky Howard
Lila Buchmann
Victoria Malan
Lisa Allred
Ryan Bergeson
Adelyn Chamberlain
Crew Christensen
Luciana Cardenas
Allyson Vanderholm
Natalie Bischoff
MJ Beloborodyy
Beatrice Garcia
Chidubem Abonyi
Alivia DeHoog
Baylie Bates
Sadie Allred
Walker Erye
Jacob Duvall
ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
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