Luanne Lewis Asta is the Founder and Director of Hamptons Learning Cottage. Luanne is an award winning Vocal Coach, whose merits include international Radio play in the United States and Canada, South America, Europe, and Africa. Luanne holds Certification in all Musikgarten Curricula (2020), as well as from The New York School of Vocal Coaching (2015) and in business from The Canadian Securities Institute, Toronto (2000) and The Harvard School of Business in Negotiation Mastery (2021). Luanne currently studies voice under the direction of Kurt Alakulppi at The Juilliard School, in New York. She also serves as Music Director for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints for the Plainview Stake, Long Island.
Our S.T.E.A.M. classes and summer camps are led by Joshua Smith, a physics and mathematics student at Brigham Young University, Utah, who is working with us for the summer. Working alongside local physicists and engineers, Joshua has curated science projects and experiments designed for students to have as much fun a learning experience as possible! In addition to his studies in science, Joshua is a talented pianist, violinist, and vocalist, having performed in venues across the country, including as a soloist in Handel's Messiah at Stony Brook University's Staller Center. He will be teaching private lessons in piano, violin, and viola, as well as several of our group piano classes.
The smiling face at our front desk is Greer Costello, our drawing instructor. Greer is college-bound for Drexel University in Philadelphia. She loves to draw and have fun and is super excited to teach a drawing class this summer!
Bryan Farrell is a lawyer who works as in-house counsel to a construction company in the Hamptons. Bryan graduated from Fordham Law School and later obtained an LLM in taxation from NYU. Early in his career Bryan was a federal prosecutor, receiving many accolades from the FBI, who focused primarily on white collar crime. He later went on to bank regulatory work and the Federal Reserve Board in Washington. Bryan is also a CPA and will be teaching personal finance classes this fall.
Professor Farrell first became interested in ancient Rome while on a trip to the Eternal City approximately 30 years ago. Since then he completed varying degrees of education and has voraciously studied many of the original sources, including Tacitus, Seutonius, and later, Edward Gibbon, along with many more recent experts on the subject. With his expertise on the subject, Bryan has lectured on Roman History at local libraries in the Hamptons and will teach his class at Hamptons Learning Cottage this August.
Anna Healy is an artist and educator with a passion for bringing process-focused art projects and storytelling to families, and she will be teaching our art clubs. New to the East End, she has taught art classes for children and adults at the East Hampton Library, Golden Eagle, and Guild Hall. Prior to bringing art and stories to families in East Hampton, Anna taught in schools, libraries, and cultural institutions in both Oklahoma and the greater Chicago area.
Our group and private guitar lessons are taught by Willy Fuentes, a music teacher, producer, director, and instrumental performer. He developed a passion for music at a young age and enrolled in the Modern School of Music, Santiago, Chile. He enrolled at the School of Fine Arts in the Conservatory of Music, Viña del Mar, Chile in 1985. He specialized in music theory, singing, and classic guitar.
He has worked as the producer for various artists, including Argentine singer-songwriter Claude Imaz for her album “oceans”. He made the various musical arrangements within the album and was later in charge of the musical presentation of the album at Guild hall Theater, East Hampton, New York. He now works as the music director at Hampton Church, Wainscott, New York and is part of the “Conga Cartel” band in East Hampton, New York. He pursues his passion for teaching as well and offers coaching for various bands and church bands in Hamptons, New York, and online.
Musikgarten opened in 1994 when Dr. Lorna Lutz Heyge merged her music education background with the experience and input of childhood education specialist, Audrey Sillick. These two women are the authors of the early childhood music curricula that comprise Musikgarten. Lorna Heyge, Musikgarten's President, Dr. Heyge, began making a name for herself in the world of early-childhood music in 1971 as the assistant director of a music school in Germany. Commissioned by the authors of the curriculum she taught to preschool children, Heyge adapted the program and brought it to North America in 1974 as Kindermusik, educating hundreds of teachers.
We celebrate each student's unique personalities, talents, abilities, and characteristics. We teach our students self-acceptance and to celebrate these qualities in themselves and others.”
Our Music Programs:
We believe that:
Ensuring your child’s success and satisfaction.: