Santa Rosa Symphony Institute for Music Education welcomes Jennifer Huang as new Aspirante Youth Orchestra conductor

The Santa Rosa Symphony Institute for Music Education named Jennifer Huang its new Aspirante Youth Orchestra conductor. Huang's recent posts have included Assistant Conductor and Chorus Director of West Edge Opera’s Summer 2019 season, Music Director of the University of California Berkeley Chamber Orchestra and Summer Symphony, and Assistant Conductor of the UC Berkeley Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Chorus. The Aspirante Youth Orchestra is the mid-level ensemble of the Institute's Training Young Musicians program and concentrates on increasing the young musicians' skills and expanding their repertoire. Students typically range in age from 12 to 18, have had three years of ensemble experience and at least one year in the SRS Institute's Debut Youth Orchestra.

"Young people have an amazing potential to connect with music," says Huang. "As an artist and conductor, I'm inspired by how naturally they react to what they hear and how, with just a little guidance, they can develop a deep capacity for artistic expression. With the Aspirante Youth Orchestra, I am very much looking forward to teaching our young students to love music through our repertoire and encouraging them to continue playing throughout their lives."

In addition to being an award-winning conductor, Huang is also an accomplished violinist, pianist and vocalist. She has performed under the baton of world-class artists such as Riccardo Muti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Gustavo Dudamel and David Robertson.

While the majority of the Taiwanese-American's work focuses on standard orchestral repertoire, she is also an active opera conductor and a strong advocate for new music performance, working closely with composers from around the world. In her musical studies at UC Berkeley, she conducted and music-directed a student opera, A Note Before I Go, for which she was awarded the Eisner Prize and the Mary Nunes Souza Award from the University. Earlier this month, Huang conducted a workshop of a new opera, Both Eyes Open, by Max Duykers and librettist Philip Gotunda, working alongside tenor John Duykers and members of the Paul Dresher Ensemble.

In 2016, she graduated from UC Berkeley with a dual degree in Molecular Cell Biology and Music. There she studied violin performance with Dan Flanagan and Antoine van Dongen and conducting with Professor David Milnes.