Isaac Schankler is a composer, pianist, accordionist and electronic musician living in Los Angeles.  His work features lush, intricate harmonies and textures filtered through a variety of vernacular forms, including new wave synthpop, klezmer and Balkan folk music, Weillian cabaret, experimental jazz, and mystic minimalism.  He is also deeply influenced by the Oulipo literary movement, and draws inspiration from their mathematical precision, sense of humor, and labyrinthian cleverness.

Isaac was the winner of the Damien Top Prize in the ASCAP/Lotte Lehmann Foundation Art Song Competition (2007), and has been selected as an Associate Artist-in-Residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts (2009).  He has also been a theory instructor and director of the new music chamber ensemble Itch at Brevard Music Center (2006-2007).

A variety of ensembles and venues have featured Isaac's work, including the Juventas New Music Ensemble, University of Southern California Contemporary Music Ensemble, University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival, Midwest Composer Symposium, Threshold Electroacoustic Music Festival, Brevard Music Center, Boston Conservatory, and the University of Arizona, where he was a guest composer at the Global Perspectives symposium in 2005.  He has also appeared on recordings by klezmer group Into the Freylakh and jazz quartet Anagram Ensemble.

Currently a doctoral candidate in composition at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music, Isaac also holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees in composition from the University of Michigan.  His primary teachers include Donald Crockett, Frank Ticheli, Tamar Diesendruck, William Bolcom, Bright Sheng, Susan Botti, Erik Santos, Evan Chambers, and Michael Daugherty.