Michael Stephen Brown

Michael Stephen Brown has been hailed by The New York Times as “one of the leading figures in the current renaissance of performer-composers,” and praised for his “exceptionally beautiful compositions” by The Washington Post.

Winner of the 2026 Andrew Wolf Award and recent fellow at both MacDowell and Yaddo, he is also a recipient of Lincoln Center’s Emerging Artist Award and an Avery Fisher Career Grant. Brown performs internationally and receives commissions from orchestras, soloists, and festivals around the world. He has performed as soloist with the Seattle Symphony, the National Philharmonic, Grand Rapids Symphony, and many others. He has also given recitals at Carnegie Hall, the Mostly Mozart Festival, and Caramoor, and has appeared at numerous festivals, including Tanglewood, Marlboro, Music@Menlo, Ravinia, Saratoga, Caramoor, Bard, Sedona, Moab, and Tippet Rise. Brown’s recent highlights include a recital at Alice Tully Hall for the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and collaborations with cellist Nicholas Canellakis and violinists Pinchas Zukerman, Kristin Lee, and Arnaud Sussmann.

Brown was a First Prize winner of the Concert Artists Guild Competition and was a winner of the Bowers Residency from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (formerly CMS Two). He earned dual degrees in piano and composition from the Juilliard School, where he studied with pianists Jerome Lowenthal and Robert McDonald, along with composers Samuel Adler and Robert Beaser.

He is currently composing a large-scale work, The Carnival of Endangered Wonders, a co-commission with the Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach, La Musica (Sarasota), Friends of Music (Kansas City), and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. His first album devoted entirely to his music, Twelve Blocks, will be released in February 2026. Brown is also composing the score for Angeline Gragasin’s upcoming film Look But Don’t Touch.

Brown lives in New York City with his two 19th-century Steinways, Octavia and Daria. He will not reveal which is his favorite, so as not to incite jealousy.