MaryClare Brzytwa

MaryClare Brzytwa is a multi-instrumental composer/performer based in San Francisco California . Specializing in electronic music, improvisation and flute, she draws from experimental, jazz, contemporary classical, and computer music traditions. She has toured extensively in theaters and clubs throughout  Europe and US as both side-woman and soloist playing festivals such as Festival des Musiques Innovatrices, Gilles Peterson’s World Wide Festival, La Siestes Electroniques Festival, Unlimited 21 Festival, and the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival.

In 2008 MaryClare worked in Switzerland with notable film director,Werner Penzel, (Step Across the Border), curating his experimental music project Radio Village Nomade. This project was followed by a year of touring Europe as lead instrumentalist for the jazz project of pop producer of Mocky (Jamie Lidell, Feist, Peaches). In addition to her own solo recordings, she has collaborated with artists such as Lindstrøm, the Boredoms, Fred Frith, Shayna Dunkelman, James Brandon Lewis, Vinny Golia, Jonathan Snipes, Dominique Leone and Wobbly.

MaryClare’s unique flute vocabulary, improvising, and composition can be heard on films such as Room 237 and This Moment is Not the Same. She is also the creator of the Avant Tot music method and book which teaches music fundamentals via improvisation and graphic scores.

MaryClare studied composition and improvisation Fred Frith at Mills College, where she received her BA in 2006. She also holds an MFA from California Institute of the Arts. Formerly Director of Professional Development at Oberlin Conservatory, she now serves as Associate Dean for New Media and Music Technology at The San Francisco Conservatory of Music. She  founded and is the Chair of the of the Conservatory’s Technology and Applied Composition Program where she wrote the curriculum for the program , project managed and co-designed construction and integration of state of the art recording rooms and music technology facilities.