Aalia Hanif

Aalia Hanif is a first-year Flute Fellow at the New World Symphony. Her orchestral experience includes numerous performances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) alongside Höskuldsson, formerly the orchestra’s Principal Flute, working with conductors including Esa-Pekka Salonen, Klaus Mäkelä and Riccardo Muti. She also performed with the CSO during its 2025 summer residency at the Ravinia Festival.

Aalia attended the Aspen Music Festival and School as a fellowship recipient and the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara. In 2026 she was the only American finalist invited to audition for the Berlin Philharmonic’s Karajan Academy.

Aalia’s path into classical music was shaped by the Nashville Symphony’s Accelerando program, which provided mentorship and performance opportunities. In 2018 she performed in a side-by-side concert with the New World Symphony and the Flute Forum master class with Michael Tilson Thomas. She made her solo debut with the Nashville Symphony in 2021, performing Borne’s Carmen Fantasy with Giancarlo Guerrero. A year later, she was appointed Principal Flute of the La Crosse Symphony Orchestra and joined the Civic Orchestra of Chicago as a Fellow.

Born in London and raised in Murfreesboro, Tenn., Aalia holds a master of music from Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where she studied with John Thorne and Marianne Gedigian, and a bachelor of music from Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music. Additionally, she was a student of Stefán Ragnar Höskuldsson.

Aalia was a recipient of the British Flute Society’s 2022 Young Artist Competition and won First Prize in the New York Flute Club Competition in 2024.