Jessica Schmitz

Described as “graceful and athletic” by the New York Times and an “intrepid entrepreneurial player” by New York Magazine, Jessica Schmitz has collaborated internationally across a wide spectrum of musical arts as a flutist, curator, producer, and educator.

Uniquely dedicated to the creation and future of contemporary music, Jessica leads a multi-faceted career embracing the new 21st century paradigm of the Renaissance artist. As a flutist, Jessica has performed as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player with groups including Bang on a Can, Sequitur, Alarm Will Sound, Asphalt Orchestra, Signal Ensemble, So Percussion, Ne(x)tworks, American Modern Ensemble, NIME (New Interfaces for Musical Expression) and SEM Ensemble, at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Symphony Space, Ojai Music Festival, Chelsea Art Museum, June in Buffalo Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, Bargemusic, The Kitchen, The Stone, Mass MoCA, Princeton and Yale Universities, Eastman School of Music, and The Juilliard School.

Jessica has worked with composers such as Steve Reich, Meredith Monk, Michael Gordon, David Lang, Julia Wolfe, Goran Bregovic, Stew & Heidi Rodewald, Tyondai Braxton, John King, Steve Mackey, Robert Rowe, and Eve Beglarian, among many others, and has commissioned dozens of new works premiered throughout the US and abroad.   As a winner of the Artists International Competition, Jessica gave her New York debut recital at Weill Hall, Carnegie Hall in spring of 2007.  She has also won the Chicago Flute Competition, Cincinnati Symposium Competition, Yamaha Young Performing Artists Competition, and the Lillian Fuchs Chamber Competition.

As an active curator and producer, Jessica has collaborated with organizations including Lincoln Center, Bang on a Can, Warsaw Autumn, Wordless Music, MATA, Juilliard, Polish Cultural Institute, Goethe Institute, Unsound Festival, Signal Ensemble, New York University, Chelsea Art Museum, The Drawing Center, The Flea Theater, The Tank, Electronic Music Foundation, and the Romanian Cultural Institute.  She is Co-Director of Bang on a Can’s Asphalt Orchestra and Co-Curator of the first annual Unsound Festival in New York.

Jessica is a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music and New York University.  Equally at home in the classroom, she has taught at New York University, Manhattan School of Music’s Educational Outreach department, and Illinois’ The Children’s House, and has maintained a private studio since 1999.

Dedicated to community outreach, Jessica is an adoptions volunteer with the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) and was a September 11th respite volunteer with the Red Cross and Salvation Army.