Biography

Short Bio

Hailed "Queen of the flute" by New York Magazine, flutist Carol Wincenc was first prize winner of the (sole) Naumburg Solo Flute Competition, as well as the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Flute Associations of the USA and China, the National Society of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Music, and Distinguished Alumni Award from the Brevard Music Festival Center and Manhattan School of Music. She continues to celebrate more than half a century as an international concertizing artist and legendary pedagogue at both the Juilliard School and Stony Brook University.

The muse of hundreds of celebrated composers, she's commissioned and premiered over 70 works- now staples in the flute canon- by luminaries Rouse, Foss, Tower, Gorecki, Schoenfeld, Schickele, Heggie, Jalbert, Sirota, Smith, Uebayashi, Gabriela Lena Frank, Sato Matsui and Valerie Coleman. She's had the privilege to work closely with such legends as Copland, Messiaen, Takemitsu, Carter, Corigliano, Rampal, Maazel, Paul Simon, Philip Glass and Tilson Thomas.

She has appeared as soloist with the Chicago, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Detroit, and London symphonies, the BBC, Warsaw, and Buffalo Philharmonics; the Los Angeles, and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestras. Wincenc has appeared with Mostly Mozart, Aldeburgh, Budapest, Frankfurt, Santa Fe, Spoleto, Music at Menlo, Aspen, Yale/Norfolk, Sarasota, Banff, and Marlboro Festivals. A Grammy nominee, and most recently recipient of the Martha Graham Dance Company: "Five Fearless Women Award", she has received a Diapason d'Or Award for her recording of the Rouse Flute Concerto with the Houston Symphony, a Recording of Special Merit Award with pianist András Schiff, Gramophone magazine's "Pick of the Month" with the Buffalo Philharmonic, and NPR's 10 Best Classical Albums of 2023 for her recording of the Joan Tower Flute Concerto.

A devotee of chamber music, she is a member of the New York Woodwind Quintet, and founding member of Les Amies, Trio Calore and Gossamer Trio. Wincenc is renowned for her series with Lauren Keiser Music Publishers, the Carol Wincenc 21st Century Flute. She is the founder and Director of flute symposiums in the USA and Europe: Creating Resonance Retreat "CRR" in the Finger Lakes, NY (www.creatingresonanceretreat.com) and with composer Yuko Uebayashi in France at "La Melodieuse." Nothing gives her greater pleasure than to collaborate, for example at tonight's concert, with former students, now holding prominent positions as soloists, university professors and orchestral players, world wide.
Please visit her on Facebook, Instagram and her website https://www.carolwincencflute.com/

Long Bio

Hailed "Queen of the Flute" (by New York Magazine) at the outset of her, now, brilliant 55+ year career, flutist CAROL WINCENC was First Prize Winner of the (sole) Walter W. Naumburg Solo Flute Competition, as well as the Lifetime Achievement Award recipient from the National Flute Associations of the USA and China, the National Society of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Music, the Martha Graham Dance Company "Five Fearless Women" Award, and Distinguished Alumni Awardsfrom Manhattan School of Music and the Brevard Music Center. Annually she performs, records and gives masterclasses as an exclusive Burkart Flutes Artist and recently in Beijing, Tianjin, Shenyang, Taipei, Kaohsiung, Seoul, Warsaw, Prague, Venice, Nice, Sofia and Thessoloniki. In North America she continues to perform as soloist and chamber musician from coast to coast, including Seattle, Phoenix, Dallas, Edmonton, Banff, Iowa City, Atlanta, Minneapolis, New Orleans, Palm Beach, Sarasota, Washington, Philadelphia, Boston and her home city, New York. She's recorded with acclaimed artists, recently including Uebayashi and Jalbert albums with the award-winning Escher String Quartet, and video/audios in partnership with her collaborator/pianist Bryan Wagorn (Metropolitan Opera Assistant Conductor) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMINYPcGIlU to sold out houses at Weill Carnegie Hall and the Morgan Library and Museum for the "Naumburg Looks Back" series.

Delighting audiences for over five decades with her signature charismatic, high virtuosity and deeply heartfelt musicality, she has appeared as soloist with such ensembles as the Chicago, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Detroit and London Symphonies, the BBC, Warsaw and Buffalo Philharmonics, as well as the Los Angeles, Stuttgart and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestras, the latter for which she was Principal and Solo Flutist from 1972 to 1977. She has performed in countless festivals such as Mostly Mozart, Aldeburgh, Budapest, Frankfurt, Santa Fe, Spoleto, Festival Hill at Round Top, Music at Menlo, Aspen, Yale/Norfolk, Sarasota, Banff and Marlboro. The muse of today's most prominent composers, Ms. Wincenc has premiered over 70 works written for her by legends Christopher Rouse, Henryk Gorecki, Lukas Foss, Jake Heggie, Paul Schoenfeld, Tod Machover, Yuko Uebayashi, Thea Musgrave, Andrea Clearfield, Valerie Coleman, Gabriela Lena Frank, Shi-Hui Chen, Sato Matsui, Jake Heggie, Robert Sirota and Joan Tower. In great demand as a chamber musician, Ms. Wincenc has collaborated with the Emerson, Tokyo, Guarnieri, Cleveland, Juilliard and Escher String Quartets, and performed numerous times with Jean-Pierre Rampal, Jessye Norman, Emanuel Ax and Yo-Yo Ma.

A Grammy nominee, she has recorded for Nonesuch, London/Decca, Deutsche Grammophon, Telarc (Diapason D'Or Award), Music Masters (Recording of Special Merit with Andras Schiff), Arabesque, and Naxos (Grammophone Magazine Pick of the Month with Buffalo Philharmonic) and BMOP Tower Flute Concerto (NPR National Public Radio Top 10 Recordings of 2023). Ms. Wincenc created and directed a series of International Flute Festivals at the Ordway Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota, featuring such diverse artists as Jean-Pierre Rampal, Julius Baker, Herbie Mann, Steven Kujala and American Indian flutist, R. Carlos Nakai. She had the privilege of working directly with legendary music luminaries Aaron Copland, Olivier Messaien, Toru Takemitsu, Rudolf Serkin, Joshua Bell, Christophe Eschenbach, Loren Maazel, Michael Tilson Thomas, Philip Glass, Paul Simon, Andre Previn, and Judy Collins, to name a few!

She is a member of the New York Woodwind Quintet and a founding member of Les Amies with New York Philharmonic principals Nancy Allen, harpist and Cynthia Phelps, violist, as well as Gossamer Trio and Trio Calore. Ms. Wincenc continues more than half a century combined, on the faculties of The Juilliard School and Stony Brook University having mentored and graduated countless rising, flute stars commanding principal flute positions in major symphony orchestras, as concerto soloists and tenured, university professors. She is renowned for her popular series of etudes and flute classics, the Carol Wincenc 21st Century Flute, published by Lauren Keiser/Hal Leonard Music Publishers (available on 'Amazon').

A longtime resident of New York City, she is the proud mother of singer/songwriter Nicola Wincenc (HOWL NY, https://www.facebook.com/howlny/). Carol Wincenc is a native of Buffalo, NY, and was raised in a deeply active, musical family, along with her two older sisters, and under the mentorship of her violinist father and symphony conductor, Dr. Joseph Wincenc, and pianist mother, Margaret Wincenc. Having concertized on five continents, Ms. Wincenc loves nothing more than "giving back" with her music-making to communities world wide.

Her recording of the Mozart Flute Quartets on Deutsche Grammophone with the Emerson Quartet is regarded as one of the definitive interpretations of these works. As a result of her fascination with the flute family, Wincenc created and directed a series of International Flute Festivals at the Ordway Theater in Saint Paul featuring such diverse artists as the legendary Jean-Pierre Rampal, Herbie Mann, and Native American flutist R. Carlos Nakai. Lauren Keiser Publishers and Carl Fischer publish the Carol Wincenc Signature Editions, featuring her favorite flute repertoire as well as the staples of flute methods and etudes. A renowned pedagogue, masterclass performer and juror at the most prestigious international flute competitions, Ms. Wincenc continues her teaching legacy at both Stony Brook University and her alma mater, The Juilliard School, graduating masterful students now holding prominent orchestral and teaching positions worldwide.