University News
Ann Collins Obituary
March 8, 2017
MACOMB, IL – Retired Western Illinois University School of Music Chair and Professor Emeritus Ann Collins passed away Thursday, March 2.
A memorial jazz concert, which will be open to the public, will be held in the College of Fine Arts and Communication (COFAC) Recital Hall at a date to be announced.
Collins received her bachelor's and master's degrees from Western and attended the University of Illinois and Columbia Teachers College. She was employed at Western from 1968-1997, serving on the piano faculty through 1988 and as chair of the music department from 1988-1997.
Collins was awarded the WIU Presidential Merit Award and the Distinguished Alumni Award. She also played with bass and drums as the Ann Collins Trio, which recorded two CDs. She was also twice chosen as a demonstration teacher at the National Piano Pedagogy Conference and sold more than 240,000 copies of her piano instruction books.
After retirement, Collins was extremely active in Macomb's music scene and she served on the Al Sears Jazz Festival planning committee in its early years. She also continued to play jazz, write jazz piano texts, helped classically trained piano teachers learn to teach jazz and served as a clinician at conventions and colleges throughout the United States.
She spent part of her retirement in south Texas, and served as an adjunct professor at the University of Texas – Brownsville.
Collins established the Ann Collins Jazz Piano Scholarship at Western in 2003. Memorials in her name may be made to that scholarship, in care of the WIU Foundation, Sherman Hall, 303, 1 University Circle, Macomb, IL 61455-1390, or visit wiu.edu/giving.
Cremation rites will be accorded. A private burial service will be held at a later date.
Posted By: University Communications (U-Communications@wiu.edu)
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