Fletcher Mitchell – Full Biography
Fletcher began his musical career on the baritone at the age of 8 in the school brass band. He soon moved on to the euphonium and joined the local community brass band where his love for music grew. He performed in many solo competitions at local, state and national level with great success winning many junior and open sections. Fletcher was fortunate enough to perform at the opening ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games as part of a marching band made up of musicians from all over the world.
He studied a Bachelor of Music (Performance) at the University of Southern Queensland before becoming a brass teacher at the Fraser Coast Anglican College in Hervey Bay, Queensland. As well as conducting both primary and high school bands, he also conducted the local brass band.
In mid-2006, Fletcher auditioned for the euphonium position with the Royal Australian Navy Band. He won the position and moved to Melbourne, Victoria to join the band in January 2007. Since joining the Navy Band, Fletcher has been a prolific soloist performing solos with the band all over Australia as well as recordings and ABC Classic FM live radio broadcasts as a soloist. His travels with the Navy Band have seen him perform in the US, Europe, Asia and the across the Pacific.
Fletcher has also travelled the world as a soloist and low brass educator. He travelled to the US in 2013 for the IEI Festival for Euphonium and Tuba in Atlanta GA and returned in 2014 for the International Tuba & Euphonium Conference in Bloomington, IN. 2015 saw Fletcher travel to the UK to work with David Thornton at the Royal Northern College of Music then later that year to Florence where he was the euphonium artists at the Italian Brass Week.
Fletcher returned to the US in 2016 to perform at the International Tuba & Euphonium Conference in Knoxville, TN and in 2017 did a two week tour of Japan performing and teaching across the country. In 2018 Fletcher returned to Europe performing at the Likesa Brass Week in Finland and returned again to Finland for the festival in 2019 as the featured euphonium artist performing, teaching and conducting during the brass festival.
2020 will see Fletcher's return to the United States to perform as a featured soloist at the US Army Band Perishing's Own Tuba Euphonium Workshop in Washington DC along with guest lecturer placements at several universities on the East Coast in February as well as returning to Finland for the Lieksa Brass Week for a third year.
Fletcher has a strong passion for Australian music and has commissioned numerous euphonium works by talented Australian composers performing the world premiere of many of these all over the world. He largely performs Australian music when travelling internationally and is currently in the final stages of a PhD at the University of Southern Queensland researching Australian euphonium works.
As an educator, Fletcher has taught at Monash University in Melbourne as the low brass teacher before moving to Brisbane with the Navy Band where he is now the euphonium lecturer at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music, Griffith University.
Fletcher was born in Bundaberg, Australia in 1982 and is one of five children. He is married to Chrissie, whom he met while studying music together at university in 2001. They were married in 2005 and now have two beautiful children, Lachlan and Adele.
Correct October 2019
