Biography
Dr. Kristen Stoner, a renowned flutist, pedagogue, and composer, is enjoying her twenty-third year as the flute professor at UF. She has performed as a soloist, a chamber musician, and an orchestra member across the United States, South America, Australia, Asia, and Europe. She received her Bachelor's degree from the University of Texas at Austin and her MM and DMA from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.
The University of Florida honored Dr. Stoner with the 2022-23 Teacher/Scholar of the Year Award, the highest possible award for a full professor at the university. As a result of that award, she was inducted into the Academy of Distinguished Teaching Scholars in 2023 and was recognized as the 2024 SEC Faculty Achievement Award Winner from the University of Florida.
Dr. Stoner is an advocate of new flute compositions by women composers, and she has performed many new compositions at major national and international music festivals since 2001, and on recitals across the globe. Her flute orchestra arrangement of Charles Gounod’s Petite Symphonie, published by Megido Press/ALRY Publications, has been performed countless times across the United States, including at multiple NFA Conventions. The University of Florida Flute Ensemble, which Dr. Stoner conducts, was a featured group at the NFA Conventions in 2006 and 2011. Her own compositions are being performed around the world, including: Elegy for solo alto flute (published by ALRY), The Five Rings for solo piccolo (available at Periferia Press/ALRY), The Cape Cod Suite for two flutes (published by ALRY), Naribue for solo flute, Variations on an Irish Ballad for solo flute, and Angels in Zimbabwe for flute with karimbas. Her Sonata for flute and piano was premiered at the NFA 50th Anniversary Convention in Chicago, 2022, and that work is now also published by ALRY Publications. In 2024, Dr. Stoner's Sonata won the National Flute Association's Newly Published Music Competition.
An active member of the Florida Flute Association, Dr. Stoner has served that organization as Chair of the Board, Program Chair, Vice-President, President, and Board Member. She served as Assistant Program Chair for the National Flute Association 2018 Convention in Orlando, and has served on several NFA committees and as a judge for multiple competitions. Dr. Stoner has performed at the NFA Conventions in San Antonio (2024), Phoenix (2023), Chicago (2022), Cyberspace (originally Dallas, then DC, then virtual - 2021), Salt Lake City (2019), Minneapolis (2017), San Diego (2016), Washington D.C. (2015), New Orleans (2013), Las Vegas (2012), Anaheim (2010), Albuquerque (2007), Pittsburgh (2006), San Diego (2005), Nashville (2004), Washington, D.C. (2002), Dallas (2001), and Atlanta (1999). Completing her twenty-second year as principal flutist of the Ocala Symphony Orchestra, she has also served as principal of the Florida Lakes Symphony Orchestra and has performed with the Southwest Florida Symphony Orchestra. Dr. Stoner has performed in prestigious competitions around the country, including as a finalist in the NFA's Young Artist Competition, the Flute Talk Magazine Competition in Chicago, and the Myrna Brown Competition in Dallas. She has also performed in the Opera Theatre of Lucca in Italy, the Lancaster Festival Orchestra, Jacksonville Symphony, and the Victoria Bach Festival.
Dr. Stoner performed a recital tour of unaccompanied works by American women composers in Paris, France, and Rotterdam, the Netherlands in the summer of 2024. In the summer of 2019, Dr. Stoner performed at Lully Hall in the Ghent Opera House, Ghent, Belgium as part of the College Music Society International Conference. 2017 performances included he Christchurch Cathedral in Newcastle and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, both in Australia, as well as at Sunway University in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. With Duo Anno 1647 (a flute and piano duo with Dr. Manabu Takasawa, piano, of the University of Rhode Island), she toured Europe in 2016, performing in Paris at the American Cathedral and in Dublin at the DIT Conservatory of Music and Dance. In 2015, Dr. Stoner completed a solo European tour, including recitals and masterclasses in Lucca, Italy; Paris, France; and London, England. She was also a featured performer at the College Music Society International Conference in Stockholm, Sweden and Helsinki, Finland.
Intrigued by Latin American flute music, Dr. Stoner has done research on the flute music of Brazil, Argentina, and Chile. Her doctoral thesis on flute music of Brazil won the National Flute Association Thesis and Dissertation Competition in 2002. She presented further related research at the College Music Society International Conference in Belgium in 2019. In 2003, she was invited to Chile to perform and give masterclasses at the Conservatorio Nacional in Santiago and at the Universidad Catolica de Valparaiso. In 2005, she was invited to perform and teach at the XV Internacional Festival de Flautistas in Quito, Ecuador. In the summer of 2011, she performed at the Festival Internacional de Inverno de Campos do Jordao and taught a masterclass at the Conservatorio de Tatui, both in Brazil. She performed an invited solo recital and concerto at the Festival Internacional de Flautistas in Lima, Peru, in May of 2013. She returned to the Festival in Lima in May 2022 as a guest teacher and performer, performing the world premiere of Cesar Vivanco's new solo composition, "Capriccio Criollo" on a solo recital, teaching masterclasses, adjudicating an international flute competition, and performing a concerto.
Her latest CD, Colors for Solo Flute, was released by Memnon Arts in September of 2013. This album of unaccompanied flute compositions by American composers has received glowing reviews from the National Flute Association's periodical, The Flutist Quarterly. Images for Solo Flute, Dr. Stoner's debut solo CD, was released on the Meyer Media label in 2010 and was positively reviewed by the Flutist Quarterly (NFA) and Flute Talk Magazine. The CD includes music by Katherine Hoover, Shulamit Ran, Shafer Mahoney, Claude Debussy, Arthur Honegger, Victoria Bond, Ivana Loudova, Kristen Stoner, Cesar Vivanco Sanchez, Eugene Bozza, and Libby Larsen. Five of the works are world premiere recordings.