School of Music

Natalie Landowski

Natalie Landowski, D.M.A
Assistant Professor of Piano,
Keyboard Area Coordinator 
Browne 217
Email: NK-Landowski@wiu.edu

Natalie Landowski, D.M.A., is currently the Assistant Professor of Piano and Keyboard Area Coordinator at Western Illinois University (WIU). She holds the B.M. (University of California, Irvine), M.M. (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) and D.M.A. (University of Iowa) degrees, and her primary teachers include Ksenia Nosikova, Alan Huckleberry, Reid Alexander, William Heiles and Lorna Griffitt.

Prior to WIU, she served on the piano faculty at Grand View University, the University of Iowa's Pre-College Piano Conservatory, and the Nancy Cree Keyboard Learning Centers (Coralville, IA). She coordinated piano youth festivals at Grand View University and Western Illinois University, and has taught at the Illinois Summer Youth Music, and University of Iowa’s Piano Youth festivals for many years. She also adjudicates state and district-level piano competitions in Iowa and Illinois, and gave master classes at universities throughout southern California, Illinois and Wisconsin. Students from Landowski's studio at WIU have been winners and finalists in the annual WIU Concerto/ Aria competition, IL-MTNA Young Artist, and ISMTA North competitions; are currently studying in doctoral music programs; and are successful piano teachers. She was recently named recipient of WIU’s 2024 COFAC Excellence in Teaching Award.

An active performer, Landowski has presented solo and chamber ensemble performances at WIU, University of Iowa's Piano Sundays and Steinway Extravaganza series, and at the Coralville Center for the Performing Arts, Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, the Upper Bay Philharmonic Society, and Irvine City Hall, as well as other venues. She attended music festivals throughout the U.S. and Europe, and played in master classes given by notable artists such as Gary Graffman, Menahem Pressler, Eduardo Delgado, Kenneth Drake and Edward Parmentier.

She frequently collaborates and tours with musicologist Marian Wilson Kimber, author of The Elocutionists: Women, Music, and the Spoken Word (Univ. of Illinois Press, 2017), as Duo Red Vespa, reviving the lost art form of musical readings. They received a subvention award from the Society of American Music and grant from the University of Iowa to make a professional recording in 2021, and were featured artists for Utah State University’s, “Women, Surrealism and Abstraction” Museum of Art series in 2022. Additionally, Landowski has been involved in other projects that include presenting pedagogy workshops and lecture recitals at several regional conferences for the College Music Society, University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s 2018 Baroque Festival, 2019 MMTA convention, and 2022 ISMTA conference. Additionally, Landowski is involved in MTNA serving as the National Coordinator for the Chamber Music Performance Competitions, and Young Artist Competition Coordinator for the IL-MTNA state competitions.