Julie Stone is professor of flute at Eastern Michigan University and flutist with the Eastern Winds. She was a winner of the National Flute Association Professional Performers Competition, a winner of the NFA Master Class Competition, a semi-finalist in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, a prize winner in the Flute Society of Washington D.C. Soloist Competition, a finalist in the National Federation of Music Clubs competition; a featured performer at the International College Music Society Conference in Berlin, Germany; and was conductor of the National Flute Association High School Flute Choir in Washington, D. C. She has performed with the National Orchestral Institute, the Ann Arbor, Flint and Lansing Symphonies, and has held previous positions at the University of Michigan All-State Program at the Interlochen Arts Camp and at the University of Georgia. Her recordings of 20th-Century solo and chamber music can be heard on the Albany, Crystal and ACA Digital labels. 

Dr. Stone's professional work has been published in The Flute View  magazine, Flute Talk magazine; the Flutist Quarterly, and she is the author of the book Notes on the Flute: A Reference for the Music Educator, Adult Learner, and Woodwind Doubler. As a composer, her pieces include Parallax  for low flute duet premiered at the NFA convention in Phoenix; Airtime!  for large flute ensemble; and Up North  for flute trio.

Her students have won numerous competitions including the National Flute Association High School Soloist Competition, National Flute Association High School and Collegiate Flute Choir Competitions, Michigan and Georgia Music Teachers National Association Collegiate Woodwind Competitions, and the NANM Competition. Many students have pursued graduate degrees at prominent schools across the country.

A recipient of a French Government Fellowship for dissertation research on Jean Rivier, she received the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Maryland where she studied with William Montgomery. Her other degrees are from the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she studied with Robert Cole and Arkansas State University where she studied with Ann Marie Johnson and Joe Bonner.

Penelope Fischer is the winner of three national music competitions, the principal flutist of the Ann Arbor Symphony, a performing member of Detroit Chamber Winds & Strings and the Ann Arbor Symphony Woodwind Quintet. She can be heard on recent recordings on the Koch, Crystal, and ACA labels & a newly-released Naxos CD of the Ann Arbor Symphony showcasing her as their principal flutist & soloist in Paul Fetler’s “Capriccio.” She has been a featured soloist with AASO. She has taught at the George Washington University, the University of Michigan & was a co-founder & founding director of the Ann Arbor School for the Performing Arts. She has an active private flute studio and in the summers she has taught at Pine Mountain and Interlochen’s Adult Chamber Music Camp. She has had flute students who have attended Eastman, Oberlin, Cincinnati, U. of Wisconsin, U. of Michigan and other schools on scholarship and some have gone on to perform professionally and become college music faculty. She has performed at Aston Magna, Stonybrook Bach, Tidewater, Kapalua, Great Lakes, Mackinac Island, Pine Mountain, and Leipzig Bach Music Festivals. When she lived in Washington DC she performed frequently at the Kennedy Center and National Gallery of Art and was principal flutist of the Washington Bach Consort (flute and traverso), the Alexandria (VA) Symphony, and the Washington Sinfonia. She was a delegate on two professional cultural exchanges to Russia, one to China and Japan, and led a National Flute Association delegation to the Czech Republic and Germany when she was President of NFA. She has served NFA also as a Board member, competitions judge, and on many committees; served as President and Board Member of the Flute Society of Washington (DC) and President and Board Member of Southeast Michigan Flute Association. She has given masterclasses and judged competitions at many international, national, and regional music conferences. She is currently president of Ann Arbor’s Society for Musical Arts which runs a Wednesday Morning Concert Series showcasing talented regional artists and sponsors two music competitions. Her degrees are from Universities of Iowa (B.Mus), Michigan (M.Mus cum laude), and Maryland (D.M.A.) with additional study in France with Jean-Pierre Rampal and with Geoffrey Gilbert. Her doctoral dissertation is on French flutist/composer/conductor Philippe Gaubert. She has given her popular Baroque Dance 101 for Musicians workshop all around the US and in Asia. She lectures on and collects Russian lacquer boxes – an interest started in while soloing with the U. of Iowa Symphonic Band on a US State Department Cultural Exchange to Moscow and St. Petersburg & deepened on subsequent trips to Russia in 1989, 1997, 1999, 2002 and 2007. She has been a host/guest lecturer on five U of Michigan Alumni tours to Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Costa Rica, Russia, Celtic Lands (Brittany, Ireland, Wales, Scotland) and Tanzania with her husband Ken Fischer who is President of the University Musical Society of U. of Michigan. Her son Matthew Fischer is Senior Director of the App Store at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, CA.