Cordelia Brown

Cordelia Brown graduated from New York’s prestigious High School of Music & Art in 1979. She has received degrees from Mannes College of Music, The Juilliard School, Salzburg Mozarteum and ultimately Indiana University School of Music in 1985 where she studied piano with the legendary Menahem Pressler. After serving as conductor and coach at the Miami Opera in 1986 she returned to New York and was awarded a grant from the Stuart Mott Foundation. Under the foundation's aegis she studied composition and conducting with the co-founder of the New York Pro Musica, John Reeves White. At that time she was also consultant to composer John Eaton in preparation for the world premiere of the opera “Mishkin” for PBS Television and also served as guest lecturer at Bennington College in Vermont. Later that year Cordelia left New York to become pianist for the Tucson Symphony Orchestra in Tucson, Arizona. During her five years in Tucson, Cordelia was music consultant to the Flandrau Planetarium at the University of Arizona and Program Chairman of the Arizona State Music Teacher’s Association where she collaborated with Nobel and Pulitzer Prize Laureates in seminars designed to explore the relationships between Music and other disciplines such as Math, Astronomy, Art and Religion. During this time she also toured extensively as a concert pianist and was Director of Music at Tucson’s First Christian Church.  She moved to Washington, D.C. in 1991 to serve as Cultural Liaison for the State of Arizona to the National Society of Arts & Letters and in 1992 returned to New York to join the faculty of the renowned American Musical & Dramatic Academy. Upon moving to Westchester for some “peace and quiet” she founded the Chappaqua Trio which extensively toured the region until finally taking up residence as "Artists in Residence" at the John J. Homestead in Katonah, New York until the late 1990’s. She presently teaches piano privately and lectures throughout the Westchester community.