Batavia music teacher has mentored more than 1,500 students

BATAVIA – The year when Carol Hoepe decided she could truly teach music composition was 2005.

That’s when she helped then-Batavia High School junior Kurt Isaacson write a 12-tone musical piece, which requires the use of all 12 pitches on the chromatic scale.

When Isaacson played the challenging piece for his teacher, Hoepe said, the teacher’s chin dropped.

“It was pretty tremendous, it really was,” she said. “The expression on [the teacher’s] face was ‘I can’t believe he did it.’ ”

Isaacson went on to receive degrees at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and Stanford University before becoming a Los Angeles-based composer. Hoepe since then has helped dozens of other students win state and national awards and prepare for further studies in music.

Hoepe teaches weekly piano, harpsichord and music composition lessons out of her Batavia home. Although she formally began offering composition in 2005, she has taught piano for “a few decades” since she was 18.

Hoepe earned a master’s degree in composition and a minor in piano from the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago.

In all, Hoepe estimates she has taught more than 1,500 students and counting.

“I believe that every youngster that plays piano is capable of composing music,” Hoepe said.

To transition the students into writing music, Hoepe has them come up with an animal or a special event or holiday to write about. For example, writing about an elephant can include booming notes and New Year’s Eve could be associated with chimes, she said.

The students will come up with four measures every two weeks until they have four lines of music in two months, Hoepe said. As the students develop their pieces, Hoepe will give feedback and make suggestions for improvement.

One of Hoepe’s students, Geneva High School sophomore Kate Kilmer, 15, started composing music in first grade because of her musical siblings. Kilmer was a first-place winner in 2014 in the small ensemble division of the Illinois Music Education Association annual composition contest.

Batavia resident Marilyn Gans, 9, is in her second year of lessons with Hoepe. She was a bronze winner in the junior composer category of the national 2015 Carol Klose/Hal Leonard Composition Competition.

Marilyn said she likes learning new things about composing through Hoepe. Her mother, Kathryn, said she could not find any teachers in the area who offered composition lessons until she saw one of Hoepe’s fliers at Woodman’s Market in North Aurora.

“Her skills are just totally overlooked,” Kathryn Gans said of Hoepe.

Aurora resident Bruce Schubert said he likes that Hoepe is honest and challenges her students, including his daughter, Ellie, 10. She received an honorable mention in 2014 in the elementary division of the Music Teachers National Association state-level composition contest in Illinois.

Ellie said piano and composition lessons with Schubert helped her learn how to play violin and also have a better grasp on the music used in the Immanuel Lutheran Church choir in Batavia.

Hoepe organizes several events where her students will come together and perform their pieces, including an annual spring recital at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Aurora.

“This is my extended family,” Hoepe said of her students.

Know more

For information about Carol Hoepe’s music lessons, call 630-761-9065 or email carolhoepe@gmail.com.