Elise Arancio is a composer whose musical language is driven by conversation. Her music is often composed of animated dialogues between and within different instruments and mediums, with energy and impulse acting as central impetuses. As a lover of words, much of her music draws inspiration from poetry and literature, and she is always playing with the sounds of objects around her.
In 2014 she made her debut with the premiere of a string orchestra piece at Emory University. Since then, her orchestral and chamber works have been performed across the country and internationally by ensembles including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, Curtis Symphony Orchestra, 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 2020 and 2021 program, and her work was also featured as part of WHYY/PBS's series "On Stage at Curtis."
Some of her recent accolades include being selected as a winner of the 2022 Les Écoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau Ravel Prize, 2020 Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra’s Call for Scores, 2019 NorCal Music Festival Orchestra Composition Competition, 2018 American Composers Forum NextNotes Composition Awards and the 2016 and 2017 National Young Composers Challenge. She has attended summer programs at Les Écoles d’Art Américaines de Fontainebleau, Mostly Modern the Netherlands, the Banff Centre, Interlochen Center for the Arts, Curtis Young Artists Summer Program, Yellowbarn Young Artist Program, and Atlantic Music Festival, and was a composing fellow at the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival and Music From Angel Fire,. She joined Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra as an apprentice composer in the summer of 2018.
Elise graduated with a B.M. from the Curtis Institute of Music where she studied with Steve Mackey, Amy Beth Kirsten, Jennifer Higdon, Richard Danielpour, Nick DiBerardino, and David Serkin Ludwig. She will be pursuing her M.M. at The Juilliard School as a recipient of a Kovner Fellowship.
