Music performance graduate found their balance at CWU

Jordan Taylor’s path to creating their own future began with following in the footsteps of others.

As a viola player at Roosevelt High School in Seattle, Taylor’s sights were already set on the world of music performance and instruction. During junior year, their class took a field trip to Central Washington University that would end up giving Taylor a clearer direction about how they would nurture their craft following graduation.

“I remember watching master classes with the faculty here, and being able to interact with them and their students, and just thinking I had to come here and learn from these people,” they said. “I really resonated with the community here, and people really went out of their way to make sure I felt that I belonged.”

Taylor started out as a double major in music education and performance, but soon realized that taking a simpler approach would give them more room to grow.

“For a long time, I saw myself becoming my high school orchestra teacher, who was my role model,” they said. “Being able to switch to just performance allowed me to see more of my individual strengths and how I could make a career for myself, rather than following that traditional path I originally saw.”

As their end goals shifted and began to align more with their own journey, Taylor found support and encouragement from their CWU faculty mentors, particularly Senior Lecturer Michelle Rahn, who oversaw their one-on-one viola lessons.

“I do feel very valued by the faculty here,” Taylor said. “They see my strengths and put in that effort to push me further. I have especially enjoyed my time with Dr. Rahn, who has been amazing in every way and very supportive of my shifting goals.”

Those applied lessons lie at the core of the CWU Music experience, supporting a curriculum laden with options for inquisitive minds to pursue.

“I love the one-on-one personalized feedback we get through our applied lessons, and you’re working with the same professors for years, which is unusual in a lot of degrees,” Taylor said. “I also enjoyed the variety of different classes available, like survey of musical cross-cultural perspectives or advanced theory classes like orchestration. I felt like those took me out of my comfort zone, where I learned a lot that I can now apply to different areas of my life.”

In addition to their work as part of the Music department, Taylor also enrolled in the William O. Douglas Honors College (DHC), a program designed to help students challenge themselves even more through advanced course material and an emphasis on research and critical thinking.

“Being in the honors college has had me working a lot on my research skills, keeping organized, and thinking outside the box,” Taylor said. “Because of Central’s emphasis on music education, having all those resources to learn how to be a better teacher and make music more accessible to students has really prepared me for my next chapter.”

Taylor will take the next step in their professional development by drawing on research from their DHC capstone project, which looks into fresh approaches to teaching string instruments to students with generalized joint hypermobility. The work was inspired by their own experience with chronic illness and the flexibility that allowed them to succeed in spite of it.

“I’m chronically ill, and there is a lot of pressure in the music industry to always be operating at 100 percent of your capacity,” Taylor said. “Coming to Central has been a really eye-opening experience that showed me I can balance taking care of my health with pursuing my craft, and the community here has been so supportive in making sure I have what I need.”

With commencement now in the rearview mirror, Taylor looks ahead to a career of teaching, practicing, and performing music, with immense gratitude for the opportunity they have to deepen their connection to such a central part of the human experience.

“It’s really a privilege to be able to connect with people and communicate through this art form, especially because you don’t run into any language barriers,” they said. “Being able to move people without words is invaluable, and if you end up being able to facilitate that learning in others, that’s a whole other level of magic.”