Member Directory

Mrs. Ana Maria Wilson Vandervort

Violin, Viola Teacher SAA Member

Ana Maria Wilson Vandervort began her violin studies at the age of three as a student of the Suzuki Method. She earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in violin performance at the University of Oklahoma, and a Master of Music degree in violin performance and violin Suzuki pedagogy as well as the Professional Studies Diploma from the Cleveland Institute of Music. Ana Maria graduated cum laude with dual degrees in international studies and violin performance from Bradley University. In 2003, she spent two months in Japan studying at the International Suzuki Academy in Matsumoto, where she had the opportunity to work with Koji Toyoda. She performs regularly at the Peoria Bach Festival in Illinois on both violin and viola, and is currently a first violinist for the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra and a violist for the Norman Philharmonic Orchestra.

Ana Maria is an adjunct faculty member of Oklahoma Baptist University as well as a Suzuki teacher for the Norman School for Strings in Oklahoma. She has been a participant of music festivals in Canada, Italy, and the United States such as Aria, Musicorda, Chautauqua, the Texas Music Festival, Encore, and Zephyr. Her violin teachers have included Rossitza Jekova, Gary Kosloski, Felicia Moye, Stephen Rose, Marcia Henry Liebenow, Betsy Jones, and Patricia Hackler. She studied viola with Evan Wilson, Joanna Mendoza, Matthew Dane, and Marcia Henry Liebenow. Ana Maria’s Suzuki pedagogy instruction has been from Michele Higa George, Teri Einfeldt, Diane Slone, Nancy Lokken, and Christie Felsing, and she was named a Shinichi Suzuki Teacher Training Scholar at the American Suzuki Institute in Stevens Point, Wisconsin during 2011. Ana Maria wrote her doctoral dissertation on Margery Aber, a pioneer in the Suzuki Method in the United States who started the first Suzuki institute outside of Japan in Stevens Point.