A
native of Toledo, Ohio, Smith has served as Music Director of
the Santa Fe Symphony & Chorus since 1999. Previously he served in the
capacity of Assistant Conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra where his role in
arts education and family concerts received national attention. A violinist,
Smith began his career as Concertmaster of the Grand Rapids Symphony and is a
graduate of the Eastman School of Music and the Cleveland Institute of Music.
Steven
Smith recently celebrated his eleventh season as Music Director of the Santa Fe
Symphony & Chorus in 2009-10. He also serves as Music Director of the
Grammy Award-winning Cleveland Chamber Symphony, an ensemble devoted to the
performance of contemporary music. Since summer 2004, he has also conducted
numerous orchestral and opera performances at the Brevard Music Festival.
From 1997 to 2003, Steven served as the
Assistant Conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra, conducting concerts on the
subscription series and at the Blossom Music Festival, in addition to
educational and holiday programs. As Music Director of the Cleveland Orchestra
Youth Orchestra, he appeared with them by invitation at Carnegie Hall.
Steven’s
recent guest-conducting activities include appearances with the San Francisco
Symphony, Puerto Rico Symphony, and Milwaukee Symphony, as well as numerous
programs at Indiana
University, including
their production of Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah. Other recent opera productions
include Susannah, Mozart’s The Magic Flute, and Bizet’s Carmen at the Brevard
Music Festival, and Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio with Lyric Opera
Cleveland. Orchestral guest conducting has included several seasons with New Zealand’s Auckland Philharmonia, the Detroit
Symphony, Houston Symphony, New Mexico Symphony, Taiwan's
National Symphony Orchestra, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, and Mexico's Orquesta Sinfónica de
Xalapa. In addition, he has appeared with the orchestras of Akron,
Colorado, Dayton,
Hartford, Kalamazoo,
Long Beach, Memphis,
Santa Rosa and Toledo
as well as at Carnegie-Mellon
University and the Aspen
Music Festival. He was honored to serve as conductor for the 2009 New Mexico
All-State Orchestra.
Mr.
Smith is also an active ASCAP award-winning composer. He was named 2008 Ohio
Composer of the Year receiving a commission for a new string quartet which was
premiered in November 2008. He has received commissions from the Cleveland
Orchestra, Grand Rapids Symphony, Eugene Youth Symphony and solo artists. His
interactive work Shake, Rattle and Roar
has been performed by fifteen orchestras, including the Los Angeles
Philharmonic and the National Symphony.
A
native of Toledo, Ohio, Steven earned masters degrees from the
Eastman School of Music and the Cleveland Institute of Music. He is also the
recipient of the CIM Alumni Association 1999 Alumni Achievement Award.
Steven
and his wife Stacia Lewandowski, also a musician, will move to the Richmond region in the
coming months.
