Kathryn Jones-Pisano

(Flutist)

After a twenty-five year hiatus following high school, Ms. Jones-Pisano returned to formal music making. During those years, she would dabble in music as a self-taught pianist, but her flute lay sequestered in the closet.

Ms. Jones-Pisano’s musical roots stem from Minisink Valley High School. Along with sitting first chair throughout most of high school, she also doubled on the piccolo; a high point was playing Stars and Stripes while marching in a parade in Washington, DC. Notably and rather calamitously, her one and only high school solo was played on her tenor sax during her last semester in jazz band. Decades later at a fiftieth anniversary reunion of the Minisink Velley Band’s inception, Ms. Jones-Pisano met-up with her high school music teacher, Joe Stellato, who commented that her grit and determination were major factors in her excelling on the flute.

Shortly after the reunion, Ms. Jones-Pisano joined her church’s choir; as she played, she realized that, by taking her flute out of the closet, she had become reunited with a part of her soul that had been sequestered for too long. Needing greater challenges, Ms. Jones-Pisano channeled that grit and determination and then mustered up up her courage and auditioned for Orange County Community College’s band. To her delight, she was assigned a chair in the first flute section and began reveling in compositions like the “1812 Overture” and “Variations on Korean Folk Song” and, as a confidence booster, soloing on the Intermezzo from Carmen.

Because playing at church and with the Orange County Community College was not enough music for Ms. Jones-Pisano, she along with three other OCCC flutists formed a quartet. Since they were having so much fun, they named themselves Party of Four. A highlight performance was the opportunity in 2018 to perform selections from “Fifteen Minutes of Fame.”

When the OCCC band was “disbanded” nearly a decade ago, Ms. Jones-Pisano and several of her cohorts weren’t willing to gamble on the band being reconstituted, so they formed the Maybrook Wind Ensemble. Ms. Jones-Pisano has played first chair there ever since, with recent highlights being performing at Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center and at the Lake George Community Band Jamboree. Another perk of playing with the Maybrook Wind Ensemble has been the opportunity to reconnect with her other high school music teacher, Harvey Hillburgh, and to play with him in both Maybrook Wind Ensemble and Rockland County Community Band. Some of her favorite selections from the MWE’s repertoire have been the Gounod’s Petite Symphony and Copland’s Appalachian Spring.

Through MWE, Ms. Jones-Pisano has been mentored by Paul Myruski who encouraged her to join the New York Guard’s 89^th Band. Ms. Jones-Pisano was primarily their piccoloist when the 89^th Band was activated to provide musical support to the New York National Guard’s 42^nd Infantry Band and to travel with them on their summer tours in 2018 and 2019 to places like the Geneva Opera House and the United Nations Plaza. During these tours, Ms Jones-Pisano had the opportunity to revisit Stars and Stripes as well as solo on Africa: Ceremony, Song and Ritual. 

The Hudson Valley Enchanted Winds has afforded Ms. Jones-Pisano the opportunity to pursue her passion-classic chamber music-while making music with her extraordinary peers.