Miss. Joanna Pepple

Joanna Pepple has taught violin and viola lessons for 19 years. She also has taught string group and orchestra classes for many years. Joanna is currently Visiting Assistant Professor in Music at Birmingham-Southern College, teaching music history and music theory courses. Having recently moved to the Birmingham area, her studio is open, and she is accepting new students, ages 3 through adult. She specializes in meeting students where they are and making learning fun and enjoyable for the student.

Joanna is a co-founder and Director Emeritus of the Tallahassee Homeschool String Orchestra. She has a Ph.D. in Historical Musicology from Florida State University and has served as a Musicology Teaching Assistant, teaching core music history classes to undergraduate music majors. She earned a Master’s and a Bachelor’s degree in Violin Performance at Appalachian State University and Mercer University, respectively. As an orchestral musician, she has served as a contract player with the Albany Symphony, Macon Symphony, and Western Piedmont Symphony. At Appalachian State University, Joanna completed her Master’s degree serving as a Graduate Assistant in the Hayes Graduate String Quartet, playing both violin and viola. Wanting to learn more about effective strategies in teaching young children, she completed the Long-Term Suzuki Pedagogy Training (Books 1-10) at East Carolina University under the tutelage of Joanne Bath while pursuing a second Master’s degree in Music Theory/Composition. There she was a teacher in an outreach after-school elementary Suzuki program in Bath, North Carolina, taught undergraduate music theory and fundamentals at the University, and created and managed a music theory lab for tutoring undergraduate music majors. Joanna has taught private violin and viola students of all ages. Her dissertation research on the impact of the Leipzig Conservatory on American music education has brought her to study and research in Germany in 2014 and 2015, funded through DAAD grants (German Academic Exchange Service). Joanna loves working with students and sharing her passion for learning and music.

Joanna is currently accepting violin and viola students at her home studio in the Birmingham, Alabama area, near Shades Mountain Elementary School.