Ann DuHamel

Academy faculty

Pianist Ann DuHamel’s performances have been praised as poetic and “… a delight for the ears and the soul” (Encuentro Universitario Internacional de Saxofón, Mexico City). She has performed in 22 countries and 37 of the United States, including concerts at Sala Verdi in Milan, Italy; Weill Recital Hall in New York; and multiple appearances at Trinity College in Oxford, England. In May of 2023, Ann was awarded a 2023-24 McKnight Artist Fellowship for Musicians. Hailed as a “forward thinking classical pianist” (Midwest Record) for her debut album Rückblick: New Piano Music Inspired by Brahms (Furious Artisans, 2020), Ann actively champions contemporary composers, recently commissioning works by Flannery Cunningham, Gabriela Lena Frank, Jocelyn Hagen, Edie Hill, and Libby Larsen, among others.

Piano Magazine applauded “the depth of programming and playing” in Rückblick, admiring Ann’s “range of sound and full melodic tone,” as well as her “clear voicing and vibrant sense of color.” "Dr. Brahms’s Book of Rags", which appears on the album, was a finalist in The American Prize in Piano Performance, 2021, and received a Special Judges’ Citation: “Championing the Music of Marc Chan.” Rückblick was also a finalist for Best Album in the 2022 Petrichor International Music Competition. Ann's concerto repertoire spans from Bach to Schnittke; she has received awards for her performances of Mozart (concerto competition winner, University of Notre Dame), Rachmaninoff (The American Prize, 2025, 3rd prize), and Liebermann (concert competition finalist, The University of Iowa). Joseph Dangerfield is currently composing a concerto for Ann, to be premiered in the 2026-27 season.

Ann can be heard on the 2022 release Tyler Kline: Orchard (Neuma Records, 2022), performing six works of Kline, five of which she commissioned. Fanfare Magazine praised her performance as “alive … [played with] aching expression.” Tracks from Rückblick and Orchard have been featured on WFMT (Chicago), WRUW (Cleveland), WSMR (Tampa), WMBR (Cambridge, MA), WYSO (Ohio), XRAY-FM (Portland, Oregon), WKCR (New York), and Minnesota Public Radio.

In demand as a collaborative pianist, Ann has performed chamber music with members of both the Grammy-Award winning Minnesota Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, as well as with Martha Councell-Vargas, flute; Brian Downen, tenor; Preston Duncan, saxophone; Tracey Engleman, soprano; Maria Jette, soprano; and Clara Osowski, mezzo-soprano. Her performance at Carnegie Weill Recital Hall with ensemble: Périphérie was hailed by the New York Concert Review as “outstanding,” praising the group of “superb musicians” who “played with power and assurance.” Ann’s project, “Prayers for a Feverish Planet,” responds to the climate crisis with 60+ new works, from composers across the globe, for piano and piano/electronics. She has been awarded artist residencies at Tofte Lake Center (Minnesota) and Everwood Farmstead Foundation (Wisconsin) for this project, which has also received extensive support from the University of Minnesota (Institute for Advanced Study Residential Fellow, Fall 2021; Imagine Fund Special Events Grant; and Grant-In-Aid of Research, Artistry, and Scholarship). She’s been interviewed about the project on Modern Notebook Radio (WSMR) and Minnesota Public Radio’s All Things Considered with Tom Crann. Portions of the project have currently been performed more than 65 times, including for the Chamber Music Society of St. Cloud (Minnesota), Nakamichi Concert Series (Easton, Massachussets), Outpost Concert Series (Riverside, California), Old First Concert Series (San Francisco,California), the Pipino Performing Arts Series (Youngstown, Ohio), Wayward Music Series (Seattle, Washington), the World Piano Conference (Novi Sad, Serbia) and as a resident artist at Porto Piano Fest 2023 (Porto, Portugal).

In 2025, Ann received the Distinguished Faculty Research Award at the University of Minnesota Morris. Additionally, Ann is the U of MN Morris Founders Scholar for the 2025-2026 year. She will present programs featuring works of Frederic Chopin and Frederic Rzewski in her series "Epics, Exile, Revolution, and Resistance: Artistic Citizenship and Artivism as Essential to the Liberal Arts," exploring the powerful intersection of musical performance, social commentary, and liberal arts education at a critical moment in our history.

Prior to earning a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in piano performance and pedagogy at the University of Iowa under the tutelage of Ksenia Nosikova, Ann was Assistant Artistic Director to Paul Wirth at the Wirth Center (then Central Minnesota Music School) in St Cloud, Minnesota, for eight years. Ann’s had the great fortune to play in masterclasses and lessons for many pianists, including Vladimir Feltsman, Alexander Korsantia, Fernando Laires, José Ramón Mendez, Susan Starr, Nelita True, and more, in addition to collaborative piano coaching with Martin Katz, Arlene Shrut, and John Wustman.

An active member of the Minnesota Music Teachers Association for over 25 years, Ann is past president of the organization. She’s performed and presented at conferences for:

• Music Teachers National Association
• Canadian Federation of Music Teachers
• European Piano Teachers Association
• College Music Society—international, national, and regional conferences
• International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts
• International Conference on the Arts and Humanities
• International Keyboard Collaborative Arts Society CollabFest
• Music, Sound, and Climate Justice Conversations 2022
• Eco-poetics at the London Arts-Based Research Centre
• Society for American Music
• The American Brahms Society (at AMS/SMT 2025)
• PEDx speaker at National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy 2023
• Headline for the Future speaker at NCKP 2025
• National Flute Association
• North American Saxophone Alliance
• Various state (Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, South Dakota) and local music teacher organizations

Her presentations include topics that range from transcendence in Beethoven, to the Pedagogy of Ted Lasso, to yoga practices for resilience.

Dr. DuHamel’s students have received top awards in the St. Cloud Symphony Orchestra Young Artist competition, the Minnesota Music Teachers Association (MMTA) Collegiate Young Artist competition, and the MMTA high school composition competition; alumni of her studio have been accepted to schools including Northwestern University, Peabody Conservatory, and the University of Iowa.

Ann is currently Professor of Music at the University of Minnesota Morris, where she devotes herself to the mission of sharing high quality traditional and contemporary classical music with students and the greater community. More at annduhamel.com/.