Ann Schaffert Miller

Ann Schaffert Miller, professor emerita of music, died September 2, 2019. She came to the college in 1979 as an associate professor. During her 22 years at Lewis & Clark, she taught piano, orchestration, and theory and composition.

“I loved teaching in a liberal arts environment,” said Miller when she retired in 2001. “Some of my best students were not music majors or music minors. They took piano lessons because they wanted to, and they studied with me all four years. Many students still keep in touch.”

Miller earned a bachelor of music degree with a major in piano and minors in baritone horn, theory, composition, and history from Drake University. She also earned a master of music degree with a major in piano and a minor in composition from Drake. Miller began her teaching career in Minnesota, but after growing weary of the state’s “brutal, nine-month-long winters,” she headed west to Lewis & Clark. In addition to her teaching duties, she was much in demand as a soloist and accompanist nationwide.

“Ann S. Miller, among all the faculty, took me seriously,” remembers Duncan Neilson BA ’92, composer in residence for the Portland Chamber Orchestra and a music instructor at Lewis & Clark “She taught me a productive mindset, and gave me the mantra: ‘Every note. Every day.’”