Cathy Oakes The River of Calm

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Official website	http://cathyoakessolopiano.com/
Facebook	https://www.facebook.com/cathy.m.oakes

Cathy began piano lessons at the age of six, but quickly got bored. Her parents sold the piano when her mother found her lying on the piano stool trying to play with her toes! She found her love for music through marching band and high school choir and began to seriously study piano. She enrolled in the music program at West Virginia Wesleyan College, a small private college in the beautiful mountains of West Virginia. There she studied piano, voice, music theory and

history and choral conducting. She holds a bachelor's degree  in music with an applied major in piano. After two years of trying to decide whether to major in piano or voice, she finally chose piano. Her professor said that she didn’t really choose, she simply “decided to sing on the piano.”  Her melodic style continues to sing through her compositions.

Cathy has spent over 20 years in music ministry and has taught piano and voice for over 30 years.  She serves as the Vice President and Director of Artist Relations at Enlightened Piano Radio, where she received the Lifetime Achievement Award for music and service to the arts in 2017.

Mrs. Oakes composes and records her original music and has traveled nation-wide performing in various venues including Carnegie Hall (October 2015), Carnival Cruise Lines (2016), The Grand Ole Opry (2017), arts centers, piano halls, homes, churches, schools and opera houses.  She has found her music voice and continues to compose and to be inspired by the beautiful sounds of nature, classical music and the music of many of her fellow piano artists.

Her works include Like a Song (June 2012), which rose to #21 on the Zone Music Reporter chart,  Let There Be Joy (October 2012), which was nominated for Holiday Album of the Year at SoloPiano.com and To See You Again (September 2013), which won the Best Solo Piano Album at the Enlightened Piano Radio Awards in 2016 and was a final qualifier for the 2015 ZMR Best Album – Solo Piano Award.  Her fourth album, On the Other Side released on September 27, 2018. Her music can be heard on Pandora, Spotify, Soundscapes, iTunes, Enlightened Piano Radio , Whisperings Solo Piano Radio, Solo Piano Radio.com, Audiosyncracy and many other digital and terrestrial stations.