Highschool senior, Trisha Chakraborty has been playing clarinet for 7 years and studying with Laura Stoutenborough for 5 years. She was last interviewed in 2021 when she was still relatively new to PCM. Since then, she has participated in the All-Southern and All-State Honor Bands and performed with the PYSO Philharmonic. She also has joined PCM’s clarinet camp for the past two years. Read on to learn more about these experiences and what she likes to do outside of clarinet.

When you were first interviewed a couple of years ago, you were relatively new to PCM. So now that you’ve been here for longer, do you have any favorite memories you’d like to share?
Doing the clarinet camps for the past two years has been amazing. It’s been great to do the masterclasses and play in the clarinet camp.

You’re part of the All-Southern and All-State Honor Bands and you’ve performed with the PYSO Philharmonic. So what were those experiences like and what did you learn from them?
I did All State and All Southern in my sophomore year of high school, and I’m gonna be a senior but I’m still in PYSO Philharmonic which has been really amazing. One of the other clarinetists in Phil, Erin, also went to clarinet camp last year and also takes classes at PCM. And it’s been so fun to meet other clarinetists through Phil. I started in their lower ensembles, so working up and getting to play harder rep as the years go by has been great

You participate in a lot of other extracurricular activities like karate. How has knowing those skills helped you study clarinet and vice versa? How has playing clarinet helped you in non-music areas?
At karate, I teach little kids and at my school I run a music tutoring/mentorship program where we partner middle school students with high school band students and we give them free 30-minute private lessons. It’s been really interesting to see how those skills transfer over, teaching karate is very similar to teaching music. It’s interesting in both activities to work with kids and see how they react to learning new things.

You’re entering your senior year, how does that feel and what are some of your goals for the future as a musician?
I am definitely going to play in college and find that music community wherever I go. I am doing research currently about music and the brain, so finding avenues to do music within my academic career would be amazing. I’m considering minoring in music in college but it depends on where I go.

What inspired you to start playing clarinet?
We had these showcases in my elementary school where high schoolers come and perform. And I heard somebody playing Moana on the clarinet. I had my eyes set on the flute first, but I could not make a sound, to save my life so I said, you know what, I’m gonna stick with the clarinet. It was a great decision.

Enjoy a video of Trisha performing in the Chamber Music Recital with Christine Xu on piano and PCM faculty, Tomsen Su on cello.