about
Elise Arancio is a composer from Atlanta, Georgia currently based in New Haven, Connecticut. As a lover and writer of words, much of her music draws inspiration from poetry and literature, and she is always playing with the sounds of objects around her.
Her orchestral and chamber works have been performed across the country and internationally by ensembles including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Curtis Symphony Orchestra, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, National Youth Orchestra of the USA, PRISM saxophone quartet, Sandbox Percussion, and Emory Youth Symphony Orchestra, among others. She has had the opportunity to collaborate with the Rock School of Dance Education in Philadelphia and the One Book, One Philadelphia program, and her work has also been featured as part of WHYY/PBS's series "On Stage at Curtis” and WXQR/New Music USA’s Young Artist Showcase.
Some of her recent accolades include being selected as a recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Charles Ives Scholarship, the winner of the 2022 Les Écoles D’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau Ravel Prize, and the Juilliard School’s Palmer Dixon Prize. She has been a visiting composer at Music from Angel Fire, Samos Young Artists Festival, Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival, the Next Festival of Emerging Artists, The Remus Georgescu Festival, and has attended programs at the Aspen Music Festival, Les Écoles D’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau, Mostly Modern The Netherlands, Interlochen Center for the Arts, Curtis Young Artists Summer Program, and Yellowbarn Young Artist Program, among others. She joined Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra as an apprentice composer in the summer of 2018.
Elise completed her undergraduate studies at the Curtis Institute of Music and has received a Master’s Degree from the Juilliard School as a recipient of a Kovner Fellowship. She now studies at the Yale School of Music. Her mentors have included Katherine Balch, Nina Young, Amy Beth Kirsten, Steve Mackey, Jennifer Higdon, Richard Danielpour, Nick DiBerardino, and David Serkin Ludwig.