Isaac Schankler (b. 1979) is a composer, pianist, and accordionist who draws inspiration from disparate musical traditions, combining the structural and harmonic intricacy of classical music with the extensive sonic palette of electronic music and dramatic spontaneity of improvised music. He holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees in composition from the University of Michigan, and is currently a teaching assistant and doctoral student of composition at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music. His primary teachers include Don Crockett, Frank Ticheli, Tamar Diesendruck, William Bolcom, Bright Sheng, Susan Botti, Erik Santos, Evan Chambers, Karen Tanaka and Michael Daugherty.

In 2007 he was the winner of the Damien Top Prize in the ASCAP/Lotte Lehmann Foundation Art Song Competition. He was also a teaching fellow at Brevard Music Center in summer 2007, and director of “itch,” Brevard Music Center’s new music ensemble, in summer 2006.

Mr. Schankler’s works have been performed across the United States, by ensembles including the University of Southern California Contemporary Music Ensemble and the University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, and at venues including the Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival, Midwest Composer Symposium, Threshold Electroacoustic Music Festival, Brevard Music Center, and the University of Arizona, where he was a guest composer at the "Global Perspectives" symposium in 2005. His music has also been featured on recordings by klezmer group Into the Freylakh and jazz quartet Anagram Ensemble.