Pianist leaving post at university after 38 years

EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. -- At the age of 77, Ruth Slenczynska Kerr, of Glen Carbon, is about to start a new chapter in her life. She's pulling up roots and moving to Taiwan to teach in the music school at Soo Chow University in the capital, Taipei.

Slenczynska, music professor emerita and artist-in-residence, has been affiliated with Southern Illinois Edwardsville for 38 years. Although she officially retired in 1988, she has continued to teach at the university on a part-time basis.

As a classical pianist, she spent more than 60 years on the concert stage. Her father, violinist Joseph Slenczynski, recognized her talent early on and started teaching her piano at age 3.

Her family took her to Europe when she was 4 so she could study with great pianists. She played her first concert at age 4, and made her concert debut in Berlin at age 6. She went on to perform throughout Europe as a child prodigy.

She once performed for famed pianist and composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, whom she remembers for his criticism.

"Rachmaninoff told me my fingers were like spaghetti," she said recently. "And he was a man of some note."

Her teachers were firm disciplinarians who used negative criticism in teaching, a method that Slenczynska rejects. She believes students learn much better with positive reinforcement.

The rigorous practicing and touring schedule her father imposed eventually caused her so much emotional stress that she withdrew completely from performing at age 15. When she was 16 she entered the University of California at Berkeley, where she earned a degree in psychology.

After several years, Slenczynska resumed her concert career. She once performed in the White House for President Harry Truman, who played a duet with her.

Lloyd Blakely, who was chairman of the SIUE music department at the time, invited Slenczynska to the school in 1964.

Several other universities had invited her to teach and serve as artist-in-residence, but wanted her to give up tours. When she asked Blakely about the concerts, though, he gave her the answer she wanted to hear.

"Of course you will do concerts," he said. "That's what an artist does."

"And what will happen when I return?" she asked.

"When you come back, your students will welcome you," he said.