Violinist Elise Blake is based in Bloomington, IN starting in Summer 2026. She will be working with the Indianapolis Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, and Washington National Opera Orchestra during the summer, and will continue to appear in concerts at the Kennedy Center, Washington National Cathedral, and other Washington, DC area performance venues.
She was a long-time substitute with the Baltimore, Delaware, Richmond (VA), and Virginia symphonies, and has held violin positions with the Knoxville Symphony, Sarasota Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, and Wintergreen Performing Arts Festival, among others. Blake is committed to new orchestral music performance and, for almost a decade, was a member of the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Santa Cruz. She also recorded Sean Shepherd’s Concerto for Ensemble in 2024 with the Grossman Ensemble in Chicago.
A former faculty member at Mary Baldwin University, Blake founded the piano trio Femina Camera with Sheng-Yuan Kuan (Piano, Lynn University) and Abigail Pack (Horn, University of North Carolina at Greensboro). The ensemble focused on unique violin-horn-piano trio repertoire while championing women and gender-marginalized composers. Previously, Blake studied and performed chamber music with members of the Jupiter, Cassatt, Audubon, Amernet, Muir, Juilliard, and Brentano string quartets.
Born and raised in Seacoast New Hampshire, Blake began her music journey on both piano and violin at the age of three. She has a BM from Boston University and an MM from the Peabody Conservatory. She lived in Washington, DC for many years with her husband David Murray, trombonist in the National Symphony Orchestra, who is now professor of music in trombone at The Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.
