Available for guest conducting opportunities in any musical format: classical, opera, chamber, ballet, Broadway or pops.

Click here to write to me: BMVolkman@aol.com

Resume overview:

I earned my Bachelor's and Master's degrees at the Manhattan School of Music where I studied conducting with Hugh Ross, composition with Vittorio Giannini and piano with Arthur Lloyd. Subsequent conducting studies were with Hugh Ross, Seymour Lipkin, Jean-Paul Morel and Leonard Bernstein at Tanglewood, Eugene Bigôt at the Paris Conservatory, Igor Markevitch at the Pan American Concurso at which I was a finalist, Thomas Martin at Columbia University at whose direction I led the Columbia University Symphony in the United States premiere of the Haydn Symphony #75, and Pierre Monteux.

Throughout my college years and beyond, I sang with the Schola Cantorum of New York, which performed with the New York Philharmonic, Boston, Royal, and Philadelphia orchestras under such conductors as Dmitri Mitropoulos, Charles Münch, Sir Thomas Beecham, and Leonard Bernstein. I also taught in the secondary schools of New York City, conducting choruses, Broadway shows and various orchestras and bands. I conducted operas for the La Puma Opera Theater in New York, and for a time ran my own opera workshop in the Bronx.

For 9 seasons I conducted the Hallandale (Florida) Symphonic Pops Orchestra and in the summer of 1998 was invited to be guest conductor of the Community Orchestra of the Portland (Maine) Symphony. I am a quick study, and in my role as accompanist for the many guest artists who have performed with me, I frequently have been called upon to read manuscripted scores and go on with perhaps only a single rehearsal. Many of these artists have sought return engagements, thus exhibiting their confidence in my abilities as a reader, accompanist and performer. Several of my musicians have come from some of the world's finest orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the Kiev and Odessa Symphonies, the Teatro de Colon in Buenos Aires, and the Montevideo Symphony.

In the time I conducted the Hallandale Pops, it went from playing four concerts in a 350-seat hall to a sold out five-concert subscription series in an 800-seat hall, and then, as a result of the overwhelming response, we subsequently had to move to an 1,145-seat auditorium which quickly approached sellout each spring shortly after tickets went on sale for the following year.

Additional Information

References

On my reference page are some different perspectives from five people with whom I've worked: three orchestra members, a soprano and a composer. (No, I didn't promise them a raise if they said nice things about me.) If you'd like to talk to them, please contact me and I'll be glad to put you in touch.

• Martin Naas is the principal trumpet as well as the President of the Board of Directors of the Community Orchestra of the Portland (Maine) Symphony.
• Richard Wagner was a clarinetist with the New York Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.
• Manuel Zegler was Principal Bassoonist with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.
• Demetra George, a former Miss Oklahoma, is a well-known soprano.
• Allan Small, who died recently and is greatly missed, was a composer who also used to arrange music for Morton Gould and Andre Kostelanetz.

More Detailed Resume

Some e-mail addresses in which you might be interested:

• American Symphony Orchestra League: league@symphony.org
• Conductors Guild: guild@conductorsguild.net
• Music and Art High School (New York City) Alumni and Friends: laguardia@alumniandfriends.org
• Manhattan School of Music Alumni and Friends: alumni@msmnyc.edu

Some web pages in which you might be interested:

• Manhattan School of Music: http://www.msmnyc.edu
• Orchestralist: www.orchestralist.org

To subscribe to an orchestralist discussion group of conductors, composers, players and publishers, send a blank e-mail message to

Orchestralist-subscribe@egroups.com


You are visitor number to this page.

Web page constructed by Felicia Volkman