Education
Brooks studied at the Juilliard School of Music, where she received degrees in piano (studying under Eduard Steuermann) and in conducting.
conductor music educator choir director
Brooks studied at the Juilliard School of Music, where she received degrees in piano (studying under Eduard Steuermann) and in conducting.
She went on to have an extremely varied career, of which choral conducting was merely a part. Brooks conducted concerts in many countries throughout the world (Austria, Cyprus, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Israel, Italy, Japan, Poland, Russia, Taiwan, Turkey, Wales). Her positions included principal guest conductor of the Istanbul Symphony, conductor of the Cyprus Broadcast Orchestra, and guest conductor of the Mozarteum Orchestra in Salzburg.
She also prepared choruses for such conductors as Abbado, Frühbeck de Burgos, Giulini, Leinsdorf, Mehta, Muti, Ormandy, Rostropovich, Rozhdestvensky, Tennstedt, and Tilson-Thomas.
Prior to her arrival in Boston, Brooks was the Music Director of the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia for eleven years. Brooks was director of choral activities at New England Conservatory from 1989 to 2000.
During that time she led many highly praised performances, in particular a 1992 Verdi Requiem that received a glowing review in the Boston Globe, surpassing the reception to the Boston Symphony Orchestra"s performance of the Requiem that same year. In addition to New England Conservatory, Brooks held numerous other important academic positions.
In 1998, Hankus Netsky invited Brooks to take part in a Public Broadcasting Service television program entitled Taste of Passover.
lieutenant was there that she met Theodore Bikel. Netsky wrote:
Brooks died suddenly of a heart attack in Houston on May 19, 2012.