Paderewski International Piano Competition

As a versatile pianist whose styles range from Baroque to Contemporary, Dr. Shitong Sigler has dedicated her international performing career as a solo pianist and chamber musician across the United States, Europe, and Asia. She currently serves as piano faculty at Ashland University, where she directs and coordinates the piano area.

 

As a performing artist, Sigler has profound musical literacy and a broad musical vision. She actively performs, give lectures and masterclasses around the world, and enjoying her multiple identities as a performer, teacher, scholar, and presenter. She has been invited to perform at stages worldwide including Poland, Vienna, Hungary, Germany, Luxembourg, Italy, Prague, and various cities in China and United States. Dedicated to the advancement of new music, Sigler has concertized works of various living composers and premiered new solo piano and chamber works. She has collaborated with Wooster Symphony Orchestra and The Ohio State University Symphony Orchestra premiered new orchestral works. As a concerto soloist, Sigler has performed piano concertos range from Baroque to the 20th century and has received praise for her artistic sensitivity and energetic emotional expressiveness. Recent concerto performances include George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with Wooster Symphony Orchestra, Ashland University Symphonic Band, and The Wooster High School Symphonic Band in 2023, 2024, and 2025. In 2021, Sigler performed J. S. Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 1 with Wooster Symphony Orchestra. She also performed Francis Poulenc’s Concerto for Two Piano and Orchestra with Wooster Symphony Orchestra in 2019. Her premiere performances and the albums of composer Stefan Swanson’s complete solo piano and chamber works are publishing in 2026.

 

In addition to maintaining an active career as a performer, Dr. Sigler’s research and scholarship in piano performance, piano pedagogy and music entrepreneurship have been frequently invited to present at various institutions, as well as international, national and regional conferences, including 2026 Western Reserve Music Teachers Association Scholar Lecture Series, 2023 Music Teachers National Association National Conference, 2021 National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy, 2020 College Music Society Great Lakes Conference, 2020 Music Teachers National Association National Group Piano and Piano Pedagogy Forum, 2020 Music Teachers National Association Collegiate Symposium, and 2019 National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy.

 

In addition to performing and presenting, Sigler is a dedicated and enthusiastic educator. She has been giving masterclasses and serving on faculty at various international piano festivals in Poland, Vienna, Germany, Hungary, Italy, United States, and China, and working with students at all levels around the world. Her students have won numerous competitions and awards, and performed in prestigious stages worldwide such as the Carnegie Hall Weil Recital Hall and the Kennedy Center. Sigler’s students have been accepted to prestigious universities and conservatories with high and full scholarships, and participated various international music festivals across Europe, China, and United States. Sigler’s dedication in teaching was recognized and inducted into the prestigious “Teacher Hall of Fame” of Steinway & Sons, New York in 2025. She was also nominated as the recipient of the Steinway & Sons 2023 Top Piano Teacher award, 2024 MTNA Teacher Honor Roll, and her independent studio was selected as the first institution in Columbus, Ohio to join in a partnership with Steinway & Sons as a Steinway Teacher & Educational Partner.

 

Sigler has been severing as the Founder and Artistic Director of the Budapest International Young Artists Music Festival, the Assistant Director of the Franz Liszt International Festival and Piano Competition, as well as the board member and the Competition Coordinator of the Music Teachers National Association Competitions-Ohio. She is an active member of Music Teachers National Association, College Music Society, American Liszt Society, and Pi Kappa Lambda National Music Honor Society. Sigler holds Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Piano Performance, Master of Music in Piano Performance and Master of Arts in Piano Pedagogy from The Ohio State University with full scholarship. She earned a Bachelor of Arts Degree double major in Piano Performance and Business Economics from The College of Wooster.