The Irene Sharp Scholarship was created by the San Francisco section of the American String Teachers Association in order to provide promising young music students with free private lessons on their instruments. Without private lessons, most students move forward with techniques that do not serve their musical needs. We hope to help students with limited financial means achieve a higher level of playing. This in turn will help them to participate in musical ensembles with their peers and can help improve their self expression, self esteem and sense of belonging.

Eligible scholarship students will be in high school or younger, play a bowed string instrument, and reside in our section's geographical range.*

Our goal is to raise $3000 which would allow us to accept four students. Each student will receive 20 half-hour lessons distributed throughout the school year.

We have donors who have offered to match $1 for $1 until July 4th.

Irene Sharp was a famous cello pedagogue who taught students worldwide. Based in Palo Alto, California she traveled monthly to New York's Mannes School of Music to teach, and was also on the faculties of the San Francisco Conservatoy of Music and UC Berkeley. Ms. Sharp was also the founder of California Summer Music, a summer music program for young string musicians, pianists and composers. She was an invited speaker at the national meetings of the Music Teachers' National Association and the Music Educators' National Conference, and gave numerous teacher workshops worldwide. In 1992, Ms. Sharp received an Outstanding Teacher award from ASTA. Irene Sharp's passion in life was teaching young musicians, and the ease of playing with good technique. She was known to give free lessons to students who were financially challenged, prioritizing their development over her earnings. This scholarship attempts to continue her legacy.

Our goal as the San Francisco Section of the American String Teachers Association is to use our human and financial resources to offer diverse activities that support, enrich and promote teachers and students from our geographical area.

*Our geographical area can be viewed at the following link: https://www.calasta.org/section-map.