One of the most highly regarded American flutists of her generation, Leone Buyse has pursued a multidimensional career as a performer, recording artist, educator, and speaker. In 1993 she relinquished her principal positions with the Boston Symphony and Boston Pops to pursue a more active solo and teaching career after 22 years as an orchestral musician. A former member of the San Francisco Symphony and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, she has appeared as soloist on numerous occasions with those orchestras and with the Boston Symphony, Boston Pops, Utah Symphony, the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional of Mexico City in Palacio de Bellas Artes, and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Geneva, Switzerland. She has performed with the Boston Symphony Chamber Players throughout Europe and Japan, with the Tokyo, the Juilliard, and the Brentano String Quartets, in recital with Jessye Norman and Yo-Yo Ma, and at many festivals, including Aspen, Sarasota, Norfolk, and Domaine Forget.
The only American prizewinner in the 1969 Geneva International Flute Competition, she has presented recitals and masterclasses across the United States and in Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, Europe, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia. With her husband, clarinetist Michael Webster, she co-founded the Webster Trio, which has recorded for Crystal Records and for the Japanese labels Camerata Tokyo and Nami.
Leone Buyse served as Professor of Flute for 26 years at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where she now is the Joseph and Ida Kirkland Mullen Professor Emerita of Music. She has also taught at the University of Michigan, the New England Conservatory, Boston University, the Tanglewood Music Center, and as a visiting professor at the Eastman School of Music.
Also an accomplished pianist, Leone Buyse served for two summers as a collaborative pianist at Jean-Pierre Rampal’s masterclasses in Nice, France. An active member of the National Flute Association, she received the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010 in recognition of her outstanding contributions to the flute community worldwide.