USA
Stephanie Rhodes is a renowned opera collaborator, having served on the music staff of the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia, The Dallas Opera, Houston Grand Opera, LA Opera, San Francisco Opera, Washington National Opera and Wolf Trap Opera, amongst others. She has garnered experience as a conductor, assistant conductor, prompter, chorus master, rehearsal pianist, orchestral keyboardist and diction coach. This summer she joins the Miami Summer Music Festival as the Studio Program Director and conductor of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, additionally participating as a fellow in the festival’s Orchestral Conducting Institute. As a Fulbright award recipient, Ms. Rhodes spent the 2012/13 season in Moscow specializing in Russian repertoire and pronunciation for non-native singers. She was recently commissioned by The Dallas Opera to transliterate Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta and is currently working on a book to standardize Russian diction for singers. An alum of the Houston Grand Opera Studio and San Francisco’s Merola Opera program, she holds degrees from the University of Michigan and Utah State University in Collaborative Piano and Piano Performance.
Based in the UK, Tianyi is the Junior Fellow in Conducting at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and Music Director designate of the Bristol Metropolitan Orchestra. She has been assistant conductor to Thomas Søndergård with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Sir Mark Elder with the Hallé, Alice Farnham with the Welsh National Youth Opera and Carlo Rizzi at the RWMCD. She is regularly engaged by orchestras throughout Wales and New Zealand and was Music Director of The Magic Flute with Opera Otago.
Zoe Zeniodi has conducted productions at the Florida Grand Opera, Greek National Opera, Onassis Cultural Center and guest conducted all the major Greek orchestras, Tatarstan National Symphony Orchestra, Brno Philharmonic, Palm Beach Symphony, New Florida Philhamornic, JONDE, among others.
Mihaela Cesa-Goje has gained widespread attention in 2009 as the winner of the Taki Concordia Conducting Fellowship founded by Marin Alsop. Mihaela is also the winner of the Conducting Grant from the League of American Orchestras in 2010. In 2011 she was awarded the Dudamel Fellowship with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Also in 2011, Mihaela was selected out of 160 candidates for a masterclass with Bernard Haitink and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. In 2003 Mihaela received the “Sandor Vegh Prize” from the Romanian Mozart Society for an outstanding performance of Mozart’s “Der Schauspiele Direktor” at the Cluj National Opera, Romania. In 2005, she completed her Conducting Diploma at the Royal Academy of Music in London and was awarded the Irene Burcher Prize. In 2013, Mihaela graduated in conducting from Dima Music Academy in Cluj, Romania with Florentin Mihaescu. She also studied with Harold Farberman, Gustav Meier, Patrick Russill and Roland Börger. From 2014, Mihaela has been regularly invited to Cluj National Opera. In her first season here she conducted 8 different titles.
French-born conductor, Mélisse Brunet, is entering her third season as the Assistant Conductor of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic, and her second season as the Music Director of the Appalachian Symphony Orchestra and the Appalachian Symphony Opera. Brunet recently conducted the operas Dead Man Walking by Jake Heggie, Gianni Schicchi by Puccini, Die Zauberflöte by Mozart, and will conduct the musical Sweeney Todd by Sondheim in April 2018. She assisted the productions of Carmen with Lionel Bringuier, Magdalena Kožená, Calixto Bieito, and Die Zauberflöte with Jeannette Sorrell and Apollo’s Fire. Brunet is the regular guest conductor of Symphoria in Syracuse, NY, and the following orchestras in France, Opéra Orchestre National Montpellier, Opéra de Rouen, Orchestre Symphonique et Lyrique de Nancy, Orchestre d’Auvergne, and Orchestre Régional de Normandie.
Praised for her “geniality” and “lightning changes in tempo, meter and effect” (Boston Musical Intelligencer), Lina Gonzalez-Granados has established herself as a talented conductor in orchestral and operatic worlds. Upcoming engagements include productions with Odyssey Opera and touring with Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra of the U.S. Lina was recently appointed the 2017-19 Taki Concordia Conducting Fellow, and has worked with a number of Boston-area opera companies in critically acclaimed productions, including Odyssey Opera, Boston Conservatory, and OperaHub. Lina is the founder and Artistic Director of Unitas Ensemble, a chamber orchestra specializing in Latin-American repertoire, and was recognized as one of the “Latino 30 Under 30” by El Mundo Newspaper in 2016. Gonzalez-Granados has served as Assistant Conductor of the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Americas and the Filarmonica Joven de Colombia.