[2] Brusilow attended the Philadelphia Musical Academy and, at sixteen, was the youngest conducting student ever accepted by Pierre Monteux.
A 4th prize winner of the Jacques Thibaud-Marguerite Long Violin Competition in 1949,[3] he performed as a soloist with numerous major orchestras in the United States.
Acclaimed recordings featuring Brusilow with the Philadelphia Orchestra include Vivaldi's The Four Seasons, Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade, and Strauss's Ein Heldenleben.
But in December 1964, Brusilow announced his resignation as concertmaster, effective June 1966, over a dispute with the Orchestra Association forbidding players from forming independent musical groups.
[6][7] In 1973, after a successful tour of Central and South America, Brusilow was summarily fired[8] after the Symphony's board of directors came under censure when it became public that composers were paying to have their works performed.
A $1,000,000 endowment, which includes the creation of a faculty position, the Anshel Brusilow Chair in Orchestral Studies, was established in his honor.
[14] Brusilow wrote in his 2015 book, Shoot The Conductor: Too Close to Monteux, Szell, and Ormandy, that he also owned a John Dodd bow, and preferred it over the Tourte.