Hi, my name is Mia and I’m a pianist based in New York City! My main focus is jazz and the American Songbook, though I have a classically-trained background and particularly love Bach, Scriabin, and Rachmaninov. Let me tell you a bit more about me.

I was born and raised in NYC and adored being surrounded by the arts and culture from such a young age. As the only child of music-loving parents, I remember going to classical music concerts at NYPhil and Carnegie Hall with my mom, trying my best to stay awake on a school night to hear the encores that Evgeny Kissin or Yuja Wang would play. Around that time, my own personal journey with music began at the age of four, when I studied under classical pianists Inga Kapouler and Golda Tatz. By the time I was 18, I had won piano competitions and became a National YoungArts Foundation Winner. In addition to my solo performances, I also formed an all-female chamber music ensemble called the Wolf Gang, performing the music of Fanny Mendelssohn in venues across NYC– at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Le Poisson Rouge, National Sawdust, and more.

Nowadays, ever since graduating from college and getting a traditional 9-5 job, my relationship to the piano has morphed from a highly technical pursuit into a form of honest and grounded self-expression. In recent years, I rediscovered my love of jazz piano and the Great American Songbook, poring through Bill Evans transcriptions and listening to Erroll Garner records over and over until I replicated the rhythms just right. By self-studying that music, I explored improvisation, composition, and transcription, skills I had always wanted to hone. Playing jazz and writing my own solos has quickly become an invigorating and fulfilling after-work hobby for me, as I get to mentally challenge myself in new ways every day.

What I like best about playing the Great American Songbook is that it gives me a sense of nostalgia for a time I never lived through. Expressing myself through improvisation or interpreting an American Songbook song allows me to connect with that culture in a way that transcends time. I think the ability to revive an entire era is one of the most powerful and inspiring aspects of playing music.