Audition Cafe

Introduction

A New York City native, Peter Arfsten began his flute studies at the age of 14, having no prior music education. He completed his Bachelors of Music and Performance Certificate at The Aaron Copland School of Music at CUNY Queens College and Masters in Flute Performance at the Cleveland Institute of Music. He is currently completing his Graduate Performance Diploma at The Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. His career so far has afforded him the opportunity to play throughout the United States and Europe. He has won numerous awards, including first prize, The Arden J. Yocky Scholarship, provided by the Tuesday Musical Association in March 2019, first place in the annual Darius Milhaud Competition held at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and first place in the Queens Symphony’s Young Artist Concerto Competition. He has been a member of the Greenwich Symphony, in Greenwich, Connecticut since January 2017, the Cleveland Opera Theatre Orchestra since September 2018, and in March 2019, Mr. Arfsten joined the Mansfield Symphony as solo piccolo. From September 2018 to June 2019, he was a Teaching Artist in Residence at The Cleveland School of the Arts. In his spare time, Mr. Arfsten enjoys percolating coffee, rereading works by J.R.R. Tolkien, and researching and performing obscure flute works. His principal teachers have been Susan Rotholz, Elizabeth Mann, Mary Kay Fink, and Marina Piccinini.