About Laura                

 Ms. Gustafson began her wind instrument training in grade school on clarinet.  In college she switched to bassoon, earning a BMus degree in Bassoon Performance from Houghton College in New York .  While she was supposed to be practicing bassoon, she taught herself to play oboe and English horn.

 In December 2000 she saw a Renaissance Christmas program that included a gemshorn consort, whereupon she went home and ordered one from an early music store in Plymouth , Massachusetts .  In February 2008 she bought another eight Renaissance instruments from a company in Germany .

 Ms. Gustafson moved to Boston after college and studied bassoon with Sherman Walt, Principal Bassoon of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.  While in Massachusetts she played with several wind quintets, in a trio with two clarinets, with the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, the Monadnock Chorus and Orchestra in New Hampshire , and various other freelance orchestras and ensembles.  For the past 20 years she has played for an annual Messiah sing at Franklin Pierce University in Rindge , NH .

 In 2004 she moved to Knoxville , Tennessee , where she plays regularly at Fountain City Presbyterian Church, and recently joined the East Tennessee Concert Band.

 Ms. Gustafson plays 19 instruments, though not all to a level that meets her standard for public performance.  Seventeen of them are wind instruments; she has never met a wind she didn’t like.