Esther, who never married, was an accomplished piano teacher. She had been active in various cultural and professional organizations, including having served 30 years on the local board of the National Guild of Piano Teachers. That allowed her to be a guild judge at various auditions and competitions. She was also active in the Washington D.C., Maryland, and Montgomery Co., MD music teachers associations.

When a teenager in Nebraska, she was a member of the debate team of North High School in Omaha in 1932 when they won the National Forensic Leagues Tournament. She studied piano with Corinne Paulson Thorson in Omaha, NE, as well as having studied piano for one year with Egon Petri in Ithaca, NY. Esther earned bachelor's and master's degrees in music from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. She studied at Oberlin under Frank Shaw. She not only went on to teach piano in Oberlin's piano preparatory department, but she also taught piano and music theory at Shorter College in Rome, GA, as well as chairing the music department at Downer College in Milwaukee. She taught piano at Shorter College from 1937 to 1943. In the Fall of 1943, she became Head of the Music Dept. at the Milwaukee, WI Girls' School.

Esther came to the Washington, D.C. area to teach piano in 1948. She used to travel by bus to teach students in their homes before she began offering piano lessons in her home. It was from 1968 until she retired in 1994 that she had her own studio in Silver Spring, MD. After retiring, she moved to the Presbyterian Home in Washington, D.C. which was where she passed away.

Esther also worked for awhile as a programmer with WGMS radio where she had been a program director, performer, and member of the Saturday Morning Music Club. She performed in recitals in the eastern U.S. and lectured on various composers, including Brahms and Bach.

Part of the information for Esther's biography is from her obituary that appeared in the Washington Post. The other information is from Kathy Henderson.