LAURA COCKS is a New York based flutist who works in a wide array of creative environments as a performer and promoter of contemporary music. Laura is the flutist and executive director of TAK ensemble, and a member of the Nouveau Classical Project and the Association of Dominican Classical Artists. She has performed across the Americas and Europe as a soloist and chamber musician in ensembles such as The London Sinfonietta, International Contemporary Ensemble, Talea Ensemble, Wet Ink Ensemble, and Ensemble Dal Niente. They can be heard with TAK, International Contemporary Ensemble, Talea, Wet Ink Ensemble, and others on labels such as Carrier Records, ECM, Centaur Records, New Focus Recordings, Sound American, Denovali Records, Orange Mountain Music, Chambray Records, Amplify, TAK editions, Double Whammy Whammy, Winspear, Supertrain, and Gold Bolus with upcoming records coming out TAK editions, Sideband Records, Tripticks Tapes, and Carrier Records.
Laura attended the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the Royal Academy of Music, and Manhattan School of Music, where she studied flute with Michel Debost, Kathleen Chastain, Kate Hill, Tara Helen O’Connor, and William Bennett, as well as composition with Paul Patterson. Laura holds a doctorate from the Graduate Center, CUNY and continues their writing and research in methods of corporeal analysis and the bodily histories of art-making.
Laura teaches at Washington Heights Conservatory and is a faculty mentor for the Harmony Program.
Laura play a custom-made open G# Almeida with a Boston cut Powell headjoint.
Laura uses they/she pronouns.