Brooke Mickelson Biography
Brooke Mickelson is a violist, music educator, and entrepreneur with a passion for community arts engagement. Throughout her career, her mission is to connect people through the arts and provide access to music education. She started playing viola in public school at age 10 because it was “cool” and has never stopped believing it. She holds a Master of Music Performance (Performance Pedagogy) from Arizona State University (ASU) and a Bachelor of Music Performance from Boise State University. She studied viola with professors Nancy Buck and Dr. Linda Kline, who instilled an obsession for musical expression supported by ergonomic playing technique. Her first viola teacher was Jennifer Drake, who particularly ignited her passion for community involvement. Most recently, she has continued her viola studies with reknowned violist Dimitri Murrath. She also has taken lessons in the Alexander Technique. She is currently based in the San Francisco Bay Area with a private studio in the heart of Silicon Valley.
Ms. Mickelson has over 10 years of experience teaching private music lessons. She owns and operates an independent music studio, Brooke Mickelson Music, LLC, in Mountain View with about 25 violin and viola students from age 5 to 75. Additionally, she is on faculty for the Community School of Music and Arts (CSMA), a nonprofit organization with the mission Arts4All, where she has taught over a dozen adult students at Google through the Corporate Arts program. Her students have scored seats in youth orchestras and high school chamber orchestras and have been accepted to study music at university (an early student is now a music educator herself!). They perform in top ensembles for San Jose Youth Symphony, California Youth Symphony, California Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, and Sunnyvale Youth Philharmonic (SYP). They are regular section leaders in their school orchestras, and a top violin student serves as concertmaster for SYP.
During her Master’s program, she taught a scale and technique class and private lessons for undergraduate viola students as a Graduate Teaching Assistant for the ASU viola studio. She has taught for multiple nonprofits providing lessons for underserved students: previously CSMA, ASU String Project, SOUNDS Academy, and her own grant-funded Subsidized Music Lessons Program. This is reflected in all her teaching as she fosters an inclusive community for violists and violinists. As an entrepreneur, she engages with the arts community by supporting program coordination and community engagement for nonprofit arts organizations. She advocates for financial accessibility for all music education organizations, and particularly encourages private music teachers to make their studios accessible to low-income families. For the 22-23 season, Brooke worked as Executive Assistant for the California Youth Symphony, supporting marketing, donor fundraising, and administrative operations.
In 2018, she created a Subsidized Music Lesson Program at Boise State University which helped 21 low-income students take over 200 affordable private music lessons in 3 years under her leadership. As a result, she was awarded the 2020 Martin Luther King & Meredyth Burns Scholarship, recognizing her “contribut[ion] to the growth of diversity and inclusion… in the community”. Continuing her mission and expanding her outreach during her graduate degree, Ms. Mickelson served over 100 low-income students as an Administrative Assistant for the Arizona State University String Project. Sharing her passion and experience, she offered practical advice to teachers in presentations at the 2021 Music Teachers National Association conference and the 2019 Idaho Music Teachers Association conference.
Since moving to the San Francisco bay area in 2022, she has played with numerous local orchestras from Palo Alto Philharmonic to Master Sinfonia Chamber Orchestra. Currently, she performs with the San Francisco Philharmonic. In 2025, Ms. Mickelson served as principal viola of the Redwood Symphony and Harmonia California String Orchestra and performed with a Harmonia string quartet, called Hygge, for chamber music concerts. She performed the Kodaly Serenade trio and Milhaud String Quartet No. 12 with Hygge. In Novermber 2023, she played in a Viola Quartet formed with members of Palo Alto Phil, performing Romanza by Christopher Lowry. Her specialty lies in 20th-21st century works. Ms. Mickelson loves collaborating with composers and has played premiers for a dozen new chamber music pieces.
Ms. Mickelson has played in orchestras at prestigious music festivals from Brevard Music Institute to FOOSA Festival. In 2018, she performed in Los Angeles’ Disney Hall with the FOOSA Philharmonic. She has played in chamber music masterclasses with the Borodin, Borromeo, Cremona, Shanghai, and Saint Lawrence string quartets. She has always been a leading player in her university and community symphony and chamber orchestras.
Ms. Mickelson has been recognized in several solo competitions. Lauded for “exceptional tone colors and range of intensity”, she won 2nd place in the 2018 Music Teachers National Association Idaho State Competition and received honorable mentions in 2017 and 2019. Most impressively, she placed in the finals for the 2019 Boise State University Concerto-Aria Competition performing the first movement of Hindemith’s Der Schwanendreher viola concerto from memory. At Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival in Alaska, she performed solo with a professional orchestra: Hindemith’s Trauermusik viola concerto in 2016 and Bruch’s Kol Nidrei in 2018. She has played in solo masterclasses for renowned viola soloists and pedagogues Jeffery Irvine, Mai Motobuchi, and Karen Dreyfus.
Hailing from the state of Idaho, Brooke enjoys exploring the outdoors, baking, and watching critically-acclaimed shows and films. Crochet and pottery are her more recent creative hobbies. Ultimately, she is an advocate for the viola and member of the American Viola Society. She loves viola so much that she set up a quartet of violist friends who played as she walked the aisle at her wedding.