Jan Deats

Jan Deats began to study piano at the age of eight. At fifteen, she was given a scholarship at the Oberlin Conservatory. Following her study at Oberlin, she attended Southern Methodist University where she studied piano with Gyorgy Sandor, a student of Bela Bartók, and with Alexander Uninsky. At Southern Methodist University she received her Bachelor of Music degree with honors and her Master of Music degree with highest honors.

Jan Deats has been teaching piano since the age of fifteen. Part of her musical career was spent in Asia where she served as head of the Department of Sacred Music at Union Theological Seminary in the Philippines. While there she also edited several instruction books in music and she performed with the National Symphony of the Philippines.

Ms. Deats has performed widely as both a soloist and an accompanist throughout the United States, as well as in Asia and Europe. In 1982, she accompanied cellist Alvin McCall at the VII International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow where he was a finalist. The McCall/Deats Duo, formed in 1977, has performed widely, including an annual chamber music series in Rockland County, New York.

At present, Ms. Deats is head of the piano department at Rockland Conservatory of Music in Spring Valley, New York, and she teaches music at the Elisabeth Morrow School in Englewood, Jersey, as well as in the Precollege Division at Manhattan School of Music in New York City. Ms. Deats also serves as a faculty member of Summertrios, a chamber music workshop. She continues her own study as well. For the past seventeen years, she has taken master classes with Menahem Pressler of the renowned Beaux Arts Trio.

Jan Deats is the wife of Dr. Richard Deats. They have four children, sixteen grandchildren, and two great grandchildren. They reside in Nyack, New York.

Manhattan School of Music Precollege faculty since 2001.