Brian Stone

We are excited to welcome to the podium the prize-winning conductor and award-winning teacher Brian Stone.

“Stone is a passionate conductor. He eschews the baton, preferring to use his hands and, indeed, his whole body, to direct the players. He often appeared to be dancing ecstatically to the music, even as he was utterly focused on the players. They responded magnificently, giving this big, warm symphony (Dvorak #6) the treatment it deserves.” Chico (CA) News and Review

“Conductor Brian Stone had everyone’s attention;” Boston Globe

“The hero was conductor Brian Stone ...(who) galvanized the Boston Conservatory Orchestra and made musical sense of every bar.” Boston Phoenix

Brian Stone has worked both in the opera pit and on the concert stage with professional orchestras in California, Missouri, Indiana, Utah, Maryland, Florida, Alaska, Washington, Kansas, Connecticut, Romania, Germany, Hungary and Bulgaria, and students at The University of Maryland, The Johns Hopkins University, Ohio University, Boston Conservatory, University of Mobile, San Diego State University, Stanford University, the National Conservatory of Colombia, The Claremont Colleges (CA), The Catholic University of America, and the All-State Honor Orchestras of Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Southern California, to both public and institutional acclaim.

In opera, Brian has conducted some fifteen different full productions and has served as a judge for the National Association for Teachers of Singing and the Austrian-American Society’s Mozarteum Scholarship. He has adjudicated high school orchestra festivals in five states and numerous solo and ensemble competitions as well.

As a young conductor, Brian was chosen to conduct in the League of American Orchestras’ Bruno Walter National Conductor Preview with the Utah Symphony, The Festival at Sandpoint’s Young Conductor Showcase with the Spokane Symphony and, was awarded the “Special Prize” at an international conducting competition in Romania. In 2008 he received the prestigious Jessie B. DuPont Award in Music Education in recognition of his work and in 2009 he was awarded the “First Honours Diploma” in the 29th MasterPlayers Music Competition.

Brian began music playing saxophone in the public schools here in Santa Monica. Already an exceptional player as a youth, he went on to win several competitions. Later, he took up viola and piano, and started composing as well. Stone is a graduate of Bennington College in Vermont, where he studied composition, viola, and literature. Dr. Stone received a Master of Music degree and a Doctorate in conducting from the Peabody Conservatory where he studied with Frederik Prausnitz and Gustav Meier. Further studies in conducting took place at Le Domaine Forget in Canada with Otto-Werner Mueller and two summers at the Festival at Sandpoint with Gunther Schuller. He also studied with Harvey Pittel on saxophone, Jacob Glick on viola, Bill Dixon in improvisation, and Allen Shawn and Henry Brant in composition.

In addition to his work with the Santa Monica Youth Orchestra and the Westside Chamber Orchestra, this season Brian will conduct concerts with the Palisades Symphony, the Westlake Village Symphony, the Santa Clarita Symphony (where he is music director) as well as leading Mission Opera’s production of The Merry Widow and Ozark Lyric Opera’s production of Beethoven Fidelio in Springfield, Missouri.