Elaine Kaplinsky is an active composer and performer on synthesizer and piano in Manhattan's downtown music scene. With improvisation at the core of her creative process, she explores the musical vocabularies that have influenced her—jazz, new music, rock, and world music—in league with her traditional classical education.

Ms. Kaplinsky is committed to both acoustic and electronic music; besides Hildegurls, her projects include Trousers, with Elise Kermani and Christine Bard (hailed by the Village Voice as "the definitive women's electronic improv trio"); a long musical association with microtonal composer David First; her jazz-influenced Kaplinsky Quartet; and the trans-Atlantic group Koan Pool, with David First and Berlin musicians Ulrich Krieger and Maurice de Martin.

Ms. Kaplinsky's recent recordings include dice2 (Ishtar Records), a compilation of women composers, and David First's The Good Book's (Accurate) Jail of Escape Dust Coordinates (O. O. Discs).

She has toured extensively throughout Europe and the U.S., and has received continued support from Meet the Composer.