Elissa Brown, 24, has recently graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with her Master’s degree in flute performance. She holds prior degrees from the Interlochen Arts Academy and the University of Southern California. In fall 2020, she will be join the prestigious Professional Studies Diploma program at the San Francisco Conservatory. Her main teachers include Nancy Stagnitta, Jim Walker, Marianne Gedigian, and Timothy Day.

 

Elissa enjoys performing a wide range of repertoire in all different settings, including orchestra, chamber, and solo. As an orchestral musician, she has performed with the Santa Monica Symphony, American Youth Symphony, and YMF Debut Orchestra, and Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra, among others. In the 2020-21 season, she will be an active Associate Member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. A contemporary music enthusiast, she frequently performed new works with the UT New Music Ensemble and Thornton EDGE. She has also attended the Orford, Round Top, and Aspen Music Festivals. In 2019, she was a recipient of the Conducting Academy Fellowship at Aspen Music Festival, where she performed numerous orchestral works under rising new conducting stars.

 

Notable chamber performances include appearing on a recital with Martin Chalifour, concertmaster of the LA Philharmonic. Elissa also regularly performs in woodwind quintets, and competed in 2013 at the Fischoff Competition Junior Division as the only woodwind quintet invited to perform in the live rounds.

 

As a soloist, Elissa won the USC Winds Concerto Competition in spring 2018, and was previously runner-up in this competition. She performed the Rouse Concerto with the Thornton Symphony in October 2018. She was also a finalist in the 2016 Pasadena Showcase House Competition. She has performed in numerous masterclasses for renowned pedagogues such as Sharon Sparrow, Mark Sparks, Robert Langevin, Julien Beaudiment, Denis Bouriakov, and Jeanne Baxtresser.

 

Elissa greatly enjoys working with students and has been an active private lesson teacher in Los Angeles and Austin. Most recently, she worked at Covington and Cedar Valley Middle Schools, where a number of her students successfully made region band. She looks forward to beginning a flute studio in San Francisco in fall 2020.