Andrea Gross Hixon brings more than two decades of collegiate oboe teaching experience to Lawrence University. Her students have gone on to advanced study at institutions such as the Eastman School of Music and McGill University, earned major scholarships, and secured orchestral and teaching appointments. In her teaching, she values both the development of each student as an individual artist and the collaborative spirit of the oboe studio, welcoming students into the close-knit and highly specialized community of oboe playing and reed-making.

An active orchestral and chamber musician, Hixon is a tenured member of the Madison Symphony Orchestra and a long-standing member of the New Hampshire Music Festival Orchestra. She served as Principal Oboe of the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra for ten years and has appeared with ensembles including the Moscow Chamber Orchestra, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony, and Richmond Symphony. Her festival appearances include the Woodstock / Midwest Mozart Festival and the Britt Music Festival. She has performed in major venues such as Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, and Alice Tully Hall, and has appeared internationally in Italy, France, Russia, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Japan, and Taiwan, including performances at the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory and the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg.

Hixon has recorded with both the Moscow Chamber Orchestra and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra. She holds the Doctor of Musical Arts and Master of Music degrees in oboe performance from the Eastman School of Music and the Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, with additional studies at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris.