Lorraine Duso Kitts plays Principal Oboe with the Conway Symphony Orchestra as well as

Second Oboe with the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. She is a music professor at the University

of Central Arkansas teaching double reeds and adjunct double reed instructor at Hendrix

College. Although a resident of Conway for twenty years now, she was born and raised from a

family of nine in Flint, Michigan. Her father was a factory worker and her mother was a nurse.

Although they did not pursue musical careers, they encouraged all their children to play an

instrument. After her studies and performing in groups all over the world, in 2000 she moved to

Conway to teach at UCA. She has also performed in orchestras outside of the State of Arkansas

such as the Knoxville Symphony, TN, Orquesta Filarmónica de Santa Cruz de la Sierra in

Bolivia, the Orquesta Sinfonica de Estado de Mexico and Orquesta Sinfonia de Jalapa in Mexico.

As a soloist Dr. Duso Kitts has performed Eric Ewazen’s Down a River of Time with the

Arkansas Symphony String Quintet at the William Jefferson Clinton Presidential Library, River

Rhapsodie Chamber Music Series, and she was a soloist with other ensembles, such as the Pine

Bluff Symphony (AR), Fuzhou Philharmonic Orchestra in Fuzhou, China, and the Little Rock

Wind Symphony. In November 2019 she performed Mozart’s Oboe Concerto with the Conway

Symphony. In August 2018, she performed Eric Ewazen’s Down a River of Time with the

Orquesta Ciudad de Granada String Quintet at the International Double Reed Society Conference

in Granada, Spain. Lorraine takes pride in her collaborations with her oboe and English horn

colleagues from the Arkansas Symphony, Leanna Booze Renfro and Beth Wheeler, where they

have performed as the DDG (Duck, Duck, Goose) Double Reed Trio. They have performed at

several venues like the River Rhapsodie Chamber Music Series and at the International Double

Reed Conference. They have encouraged several composers like John Steinmetz, Robert Boury,

Paul Dickinson, and Christopher Theofanidis to write music for their trio including the Triple

Concerto for double reed trio by Michael Fine, which premiered with the ASO in April 2018.

Dr. Duso Kitts spends her summers in Sidney, Maine teaching oboe at the New England Music

Camp, a six-week summer program for junior high and senior high school students. She received

her Bachelor of Music degree in Oboe Performance from the Indiana University, her Master of

Music degree in English horn and Oboe Performance from Manhattan School of Music and her

Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in Oboe Performance from the University of Michigan. Her

teachers include Jerry Sirucek, Joseph Robinson, Tom Stacy and Harry Sargous. If she is not

playing her oboe or bassoon, Dr. Kitts is out sailing on Lake Maumelle with her husband of

seven years, Thomas Kitts. Visit her website at www.lorrainedusokitts.com for more

information.