Oboist & Conductor

Lauren M. Smith multi-faceted musician from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, currently based in Rochester, New York. She specializes as an oboist and conductor.

As founder of the Louisiana Art Music Collective, Lauren serves as the organization’s Executive and Artistic Director. The Collective’s July 2024 concert served over one hundred members of the south Louisiana community, offering a free concert experience featuring wind serenades. Lauren made her conducting debut in 2023, leading a chamber orchestra in the premiere of composer Jake Ellzey’s Cretaceous Poem.

Lauren has performed engagements with various ensembles as an oboist and English hornist, including but not limited to, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra, Eastman Philharmonia, Eastman Wind Ensemble, Eastman Opera Theatre, Musica Nova, and the Rapides Symphony Orchestra. She was recently principal oboe on the Eastman Wind Ensemble’s soon to be released recording of Jeff Tyzik’s Symphonies. Lauren was selected as an oboist for the Chautauqua Music Festival 2022 summer season. She was also a 2023 Fellow at the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival in affiliation with the Yale School of Music, performing in weekly concerts alongside fellows, faculty, and guest artists. During her undergraduate studies, she won First Prize for the Baton Rouge Music Club Competition in 2022 and offered a recital as winner of the competition’s Instrumental Division.

Lauren interned for the Gateways Music Festival in Fall 2023 and assisted behind the scenes for numerous performances in Rochester, NY and New York, NY. She was also an Organizer for Context Conference: Contextualizing Equity & Inclusion in Music, the first national academic conference with such a focus.

As an educator, Lauren has a private oboe studio, teaches students at the University of Rochester, is an experienced Teaching/Graduate Assistant, and was recently named Adjunct Instructor of Oboe at Houghton University and a Teaching Intern for the Eastman Community Music School. After careful review by the faculty, Lauren was awarded the Eastman School of Music’s prestigious Graduate Teaching Assistant Prize for the 2023-24 school year. She was also recently elected as Graduate Advisor for the Black Student Union at Eastman.

Lauren received a Bachelor of Music degree from the Louisiana State University Ogden Honors College and the LSU School of Music, where she was awarded University honors including summa cum laude, President’s Honor Roll, and College Honors for completing honors course work and defending her honors thesis. She is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Oboe Performance & Literature at the Eastman School of Music under Dr. Richard Killmer. Lauren’s primary oboe teachers include Dr. Killmer, Titus Underwood, and Johanna Cox Pennington.

Beyond music, Lauren is family-oriented, a passionate writer, lover of history, and an amateur connoisseur of Louisiana cuisine.