Isaiah founded Cooper Law LLC in New Haven, Connecticut at the beginning of 2004. Isaiah is admitted to practice in Connecticut and New York, and to practice before the United States Tax Court.

Prior to his career in corporate law, Isaiah was a professional trombonist. Isaiah Cooper performed as principal trombonist with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra in Israel in 1985-86, the Friedens Orchester (Peace Orchestra) in 1984-85, the Santa Monica Symphony in California from 1982-1984, and has done recording work in Los Angeles, California, Memphis, Tennessee and Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, Israel. He has performed in marching bands, salsa bands, soul bands, klezmer bands, big bands, chamber music, and theatrical avant garde ensembles.

As an orchestral performer, Isaiah realized the benefit of hard work and considerable advanced practice and preparation to be sure he got the music right. As a composer, Isaiah found it critical to select the instrumentation, style, and meter in order to have the freedom within that structure to create. As an improviser, Isaiah learned how to take a wrong note or dissonance and make it lead to the right one, when to leave some silence, and when to play more.

As an attorney, Isaiah is applying the same principles to his law practice. He continues to prepare, to study and to learn. He has learned to select (or find) the right materials for each transaction, and his flexibility and understanding of when to use silence and when to speak helps him to negotiate effectively to solve or turn around difficult situations. After years of high-level performance as a musician, starting out as a lawyer was challenging for Mr. Cooper. Now that he has attained a similar high-level of ability as an attorney he is passionate about bringing together the elements of each deal.

Isaiah grew up living on a small chicken farm outside of Middletown, New York. His family sold eggs to local businesses, through a local farmer’s cooperative in Sullivan County (in the Catskills) and from a drive-in window designed by his mother to extend from the mud room of their farmhouse (This was before banks, fast-food "restaurants" and pharmacies had drive-in windows). Isaiah learned to make change selling eggs when he was approximately seven years old.

The family closed down the farming operation in 1967 when Isaiah’s father got re-certified and began teaching school in Middletown. Unfortunately Isaiah’s father died of a heart attack near the beginning of his second year of teaching in September 1968, when Isaiah was 13. Isaiah’s family moved off of the farm and into Middletown in 1970.

Isaiah majored in music at the State University of New York in Buffalo (SUNY at Buffalo). Isaiah was originally enrolled in a five-year bachelors/masters program in music education, but, wanting to know more about making music before committing to teaching it, he transferred to a trombone performance major, getting his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, summa cum laude in 1978. Isaiah studied with Richard Myers, then principal trombonist of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra at SUNY Buffalo, and privately with Don Miller (of blessed memory), then the Buffalo Philharmonic’s bass trombonist. Isaiah played in El Grande SOnito, a salsa band, during his freshman year, and in the Equinox Soul Band, a ten-piece band during his sophomore and junior years (see the picture below). Isaiah started doing a fair amount of teaching and freelance playing during his last couple of years in Buffalo.

Isaiah worked on his Master of Music degree at Youngstown State University from 1978 to 1980, studying with Vern Kagarice (currently at North Texas State University School of Music). During the summer of 1979 Isaiah toured the Great Lakes Region with the American Wind Symphony Orchestra, performing at waterfront parks from a motorized barge/floating stage.

Isaiah attended Memphis State University as a graduate/doctoral student from 1980 to 1982. Isaiah studied with Douglas Lemmon (of blessed memory) at MSU and did a great deal of teaching and performing in Memphis. During this period Isaiah was the “first call” substitute trombonist in the Memphis studios (where he recorded commercial jingles), the Memphis Symphony, the Memphis Opera, the Memphis Concert Band and other organizations. Isaiah was able to perform with an (not quite) all African-American big band which included alumni of The Memphis Horns, The Ray Charles Band, Aretha Franklin and others. Isaiah even got to play for a rodeo in Memphis. During the summer of 1982, Isaiah worked as an usher at the amphitheatre at the then new Mud Island River Park. Rather than just ushering, Isaiah was often given the responsibility for transporting the entertainment to and from the facility. In this connection Isaiah met Al Jarreau, David Sanborn, Donny Osmond, Hal Holbrook and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

Isaiah decided to matriculate for a doctorate at a better music school and transferred to the University of Southern California in 1982. Isaiah spent two years (from 1982 to 1984) in the L.A. area during which time he worked hard towards a doctor of musical arts degree. Isaiah studied with Dr. Terry Cravens at USC and privately with Ralph Sauer, principal trombonist in the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. During these years, Isaiah also taught and freelanced extensively, performing as principal trombonist with the Santa Monica Symphony, the Korean Orchestra of Los Angeles, the Japanese Orchestra of Los Angeles and the Orchestra of the Barrio. Isaiah also put significant energy into composing and conducting, and premiered a number of new compositions, including ones he wrote. His improvisational avant garde band, Concurrents, did a live broadcast on public radio station KPFK in Southern California in 1984.

Isaiah received a grant from the German Academic Exchange Service and spent from August 1984 until July 1985 in Germany, two months studying German in Freiburg, and ten months studying and freelancing in Stuttgart and around Germany. Isaiah played with a Salsa band (again) in Stuttgart. This band included players from Puerto Rico, Colombia, Greece, Peru, Argentina and Germany, in addition to Isaiah. He was also able to premier several compositions, both his own and pieces by others, including a piece for three alphorns (remember the Ricola cough drops commercial?), brass and percussion.

During that year Dr. Armin Rosin, Isaiah’s teacher in Germany, did a series of recitals in Israel and discovered that the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO) needed a new principal trombonist. The JSO’s music director, Gary Bertini, was also the conductor of the West German Radio Orchestra, so Isaiah was able to audition for the job in Jerusalem while still in Germany. The following year (1985-86) Isaiah served as principal trombonist in the JSO and freelanced with a big band from Tel Aviv and with the Israel Chamber Orchestra. The picture of Isaiah in white tie and tails is in his apartment in Jerusalem, just before a JSO concert. At the end of his year in Jerusalem, the JSO did a tour in Germany, the first time since the Holocaust that a Jewish orchestra performed there.

Isaiah returned to the United States in the summer of 1986. Isaiah took the paralegal position at Herzfeld and Rubin and moved in with his brother in Park Slope, Brooklyn. He met his wife, Lauri Lowell, at the Park Slope Jewish Center. They got married at Park Slope Jewish Center in June of 1988 and Isaiah began law school two months later.

He resides in Hamden, Connecticut with his wife, Lauri, and their two sons.