Ward Stare Music Director Announcement: Media Kit

Ward Stare Named Music Director

The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra is pleased to announce Ward Stare, a Rochester native who has earned international accolades as a conductor, as the orchestra’s twelfth Music Director in 91 years. Stare has been described as "one of the hottest young conductors in America" by the St. Louis Post Dispatch and "a rising star in the conducting firmanent" by the Chicago Tribune.

Stare will open the 2014/15 season at Kodak Hall with a special RPO Philharmonics concert featuring guest soloist Midori. In February, Stare will lead the RPO in a special performance of one of Verdi’s most poignant operas, La Traviata.

He recently completed his tenure as Resident Conductor of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra (2008-2012), and made his conducting debuts with the Opera Theatre of St. Louis and Washington National Opera. His current season includes a number of highly-anticipated debuts with orchestras around the world, including performances with the

Ward Stare Credit: Halski Studio

Baltimore Symphony, Sydney Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Calgary Philharmonic, and the
New World Symphony. He returns to the Lyric Opera of Chicago in November to lead performances of Porgy and Bess.

Stare was the recipient of both the Robert J. Harth Conductor Prize (2006) and the Aspen Conducting Prize (2007) at the Aspen Music Festival before spending the 2007-08 season as a League of American Orchestras Fellow with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.  Stare has studied conducting with David Zinman, János Fürst and Jorma Panula, and worked with Michel Merlet in composition and musical analysis.

Following in the path of many great orchestral conductors whose careers began as instrumentalists, Stare was trained as a trombonist at the Juilliard School in Manhattan.  At the age of 18, he was appointed principal trombonist of the Lyric Opera of Chicago and has performed as an orchestral musician with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic, among others.  As a soloist, he has performed in both the U.S. and Europe.

Click the links below for the full press release, images, videos, and additional information about The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra.

PRESS RELEASE
Read the press release

FULL BIOGRAPHY
Read more about Ward Stare

IMAGES
Download high resolution images

VIDEO
Watch a welcome message from Ward Stare

ROCHESTER PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA CONDUCTORS
Jeff Tyzik, Principal Pops Conductor
Michael Butterman, Principal Conductor for Education and Community Engagement (The Louise and Henry Epstein Family Chair)
Christopher Seaman, Conductor Laureate (The Christopher Seaman Chair, supported by Barbara & Patrick Fulford and The Conductor Laureate Society)