Brandon Patrick George

Brandon Patrick George is an important flutist known for his work with the chamber group Imani Winds. He has also made many appearances as a concerto soloist and as an orchestral player and has played contemporary music in various settings. George was born in Dayton, Ohio, in 1986. His family was not musical, but he became fascinated by a flute he saw in a pawnshop window, and teachers at the city's public Residence Park Elementary School encouraged his efforts on the flute. He then attended Dayton's Stivers School for the Arts magnet school, graduating in 2004. George went on to Ohio's Oberlin Conservatory, studying with Michel Debost. He took lessons from Sophie Cherrier in Paris before returning to the U.S. and earning a master's degree at the Manhattan School of Music, where he won the school's concerto competition. George has a distinguished concert record: he has given recitals at Alice Tully Hall and Carnegie Hall in New York, the Kennedy Center in Washington, and the Cité de la Musique in Paris. He has performed as a member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony, and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, as well as with the International Contemporary Ensemble. George has played concertos with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra under Robert Spano, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, and the American Composers Orchestra, among others. He has collaborated with various other contemporary musicians and groups, including Eighth Blackbird and the Jasper String Quartet, and in 2018, he became the flutist of the chamber group Imani Winds, replacing its founding flutist, Valerie Coleman. George was signed to the Profil label and released his debut album, Flute Sonatas & Solo Works: Bach, Boulez, Aho, Prokofiev, in 2020. On the album, he played a platinum flute designed by Verne Powell for the 1939 World's Fair in New York, said to be the world's most expensive flute. He returned in 2023 on the In a Circle label with the solo flute recital Twofold.
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