Dr. Cynthia Cripps
Assistant Professor
Saxophone / Bassoon
Department of Music and Dance
College of Arts and Humanities
The University of Texas - Pan American
Email: ccripps@utpa.edu
Office: Fine Arts Building 113B
Phone: (956)381-3474

Dr. Cynthia Cripps joined UTPA’s music faculty in 2006.  She currently teaches applied saxophone lessons, saxophone ensembles, bassoon, woodwind methods and recently became graduate advisor.  She organizes and directs UTPA’s Summer Saxophone Ensemble and SUMMERFEST concert series.

Born in Newaygo, Michigan, Dr. Cripps has attended universities in Michigan, Indiana, and Florida.  She has studied saxophone with John Nichol, Hannes Kawrza, George Wolfe, Tyler Kuebler, Dale Underwood, and Gary Keller. Her bassoon teachers include MaryBeth Minnis, Homer Pence, James Hansen, and Luciano Magnanini.

Dr. Cripps resided in the Republic of Panama for ten years.  She played bassoon and saxophone in the Panama Symphony Orchestra from 1993-1999.  From 1997-2003, she taught band, grades 6-12, at the International School of Panama (ISP).  Dr. Cripps worked on curricula design at ISP and developed an eight-year saxophone program for the Instituto Nacional de Musica (INM - music conservatory) where she taught saxophone from 1994-2003. 

Dr. Cripps has performed solo and quartet recitals and presented lectures at the North American Saxophone Alliance (NASA) Biennial Conference (Columbia, SC), the SMU (Dallas, TX) Region IV NASA Conference, the 13th and 14th World Saxophone Congresses in Minneapolis, MN and Ljubjana, Slovenia, the Instituto Nacional de Musica (Panama), and the UTPA campus.

As part of her DMA, she traveled to the countries of Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama and Guatemala to research and complete her essay "Classical Saxophone Curricula in Central America."

In Michigan, Indiana, Panama, Florida, and Texas, Cindy has participated in many community orchestras, concert and jazz bands, including pit orchestras for productions such as: Evita, Bye, Bye Birdie, Anything Goes, Mikado, and The Rothchilds.