Elise Sobol, music educator and concert pianist, has sustained a multi-faceted career in music since her public recital debut at the age of eight. Author of An Attitude and Approach for Teaching Music to Special Learners (Pentland Press, USA 2001), she has received international recognition for her work in special music education. She is a contributing author to two state education publications: Music-A Resource Guide for Standards Based Instruction 2002 and Tools for Schools Improving Student Achievement through the Arts 2001. Her extensive biographies appear in the prestigious publications of Marquis, the American Biographical Institute and the International Biographical Centre (Cambridge, England). These have earned her invitations to perform and lecture here in North America, - throughout New York, in Boston, Chicago, Norfolk, San Francisco, Vancouver, B.C., and Washington, D.C., and overseas in Portugal, England, New Zealand, Australia and Ireland.

Since 1993, Elise Sobol has been appointed as the New York State School Music Association, Music for Special Learners Chair. Her work serving the community has brought her citations from the Town Board of Oyster Bay, the New York State Assembly, nomination for the New York State Senate “Women of Distinction” program, the 2004 Ernest Kay International Foundation Award, the United Cultural Convention's Peace Prize, the Very Special Arts Award of Honor appearance on Channel 12 News and in Newsday's column Long Island Life Winners. She serves full time on the music faculty of the Department of Special Education of Nassau BOCES, and as adjunct professor in the School of Visual and Performing Arts of Long Island University, C. W. Post Campus and the Steinhardt School of Education of New York University. Trained by renowned piano pedagogues at the Mannes College and Juilliard Schools of Music, including Murray Perahia, the late Roslyn Tureck and Nadia Reisenberg, Elise Sobol completed three degrees in music and music education: A.A. degree at Simon's Rock of Bard College, Great Barrington, Massachusetts, B.A. degree at New York's New School University, and M.A. at Teachers College, Columbia University. She continues with her post-graduate studies in neuromusicology, developing materials and methods for enhancing music learning outcomes and a higher quality of living for the severely challenged.

Her appearance for the New York State Band Directors Association in March 2005 will allow band and instrumental ensemble directors to learn an attitude and approach for teaching music to students with additional needs, which includes a multisensory/multi-modal method of teaching to successfully reach all performing musicians.