JoAnn Falletta

conductor

Hailed by The New York Times as “...one of the finest conductors of her generation,” JoAnn Falletta currently holds the positions of Music Director of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Virginia Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Advisor to the Honolulu Symphony. An effervescent and exuberant figure on the podium, she has been praised by the Washington Post as having “Toscanini’s tight control over ensemble, Walter’s affectionate balancing of inner voices, Stokowski’s gutsy showmanship, and a controlled frenzy worthy of Bernstein.”
Highlights of Maestro Falletta’s 2005/06 season with the Buffalo Philharmonic include the release of the Orchestra’s third recording on the Naxos label: Music on the Prairie, featuring the music of Aaron Copland, and a recording of their fourth Naxos disc, featuring the music of Ottorino Respighi. A fifth disc, with the music of John Corigliano is planned for 2006/07. This season will see the second JoAnn Falletta International Guitar Concerto Competition in Buffalo. Continuing to raise the BPO’s national and international prominence, Ms. Falletta will once again lead the orchestra in a number of concerts to be broadcast nationally on NPR’s Performance Today and SymphonyCast and international broadcasts through the European Broadcasting Union.
 Highlights of Maestro Falletta’s season with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra include the grand opening of a second home for the Symphony—the Ferguson Center for the Arts in Newport News and a recording of the works of Emmy-award winning composer, John Duffy, Composer-in-Residence for the VSO. She will lead both the Buffalo Philharmonic and the Virginia Symphony in a series of concerts celebrating Mozart’s 250th birthday.
 Ms. Falletta has been invited to guest conduct many of the world’s finest symphony orchestras. Highlights of her guest conducting appearances this season include the Philadelphia Orchestra, the National Symphony, and the orchestras of Montreal, San Francisco, Toronto, Detroit, Milwaukee, Honolulu, and Omaha. Recent and upcoming international appearances include her debuts with the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony and the Jerusalem Symphony and return engagements with the Residentie Orchestra of the Hague, the Nurnberg Philharmonic, Bretagne, and Orquestra Filarmonica de la UNAM. She has guest conducted over 75 orchestras across North America, Europe, Asia and Africa.
Ms. Falletta has won the coveted Stokowski Competition and the Seaver, Toscanini, Ditson and Bruno Walter Awards for conducting. As a champion of contemporary music, she has performed over 300 works by American composers, including more than 70 world premieres, and has received eight consecutive awards from ASCAP for creative programming, the 2004 ASCAP/ASOL award for Adventurous Programming with the BPO, and the ASOL’s prestigious John S. Edwards Award. A strong advocate for cultural partnerships and community involvement, Maestro Falletta was named Buffalo’s most influential community leader, and Buffalo and Erie County’s Artist of the Year for excellence in creating and supporting the arts in Western New York.
 Maestro Falletta has been nominated for a Grammy in the category of Instrumental Soloist Performance with Orchestra for her recent recording with English Horn soloist Thomas Stacy and the London Symphony Orchestra of Eventide, by Kenneth Fuchs, which is included in Kenneth Fuchs: An American Place, issued on the Naxos American Classics label this Fall. Her growing discography includes almost 40 titles. Her 2004 recording of Griffes Orchestral Music, on the Naxos label with the Buffalo Philharmonic, was selected as an Editor’s Choice Recording by Gramophone. Other highly acclaimed recent recordings include Burchfield Gallery, with music by Morton Gould and Jean Sibelius (BPO), Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, a recording of the Orchestra’s June 2004 performance in New York City, with music of Kodaly, Smetana and Zemlinsky, The American Cello with the Virginia Symphony (Albany) and Behzad Ranjbaran - Persian Trilogy, with the London Symphony (Delos), The Music of Frederick Converse (Naxos American Classics), and Schubert’s Guitar (Koch), featuring Ms. Falletta as guitarist and arranger.
 A native of New York City, Ms. Falletta received her undergraduate degree from the Mannes College of Music and her master’s and doctorate degrees from The Juilliard School.