WORKSHOP LECTURER
Robert Page
Conductor
Robert Page, known as the dean of America's choral conductors, was named Pennsylvania's Artist of the Year by Governor Tom Ridge in 1998 and 'a national treasure' by American Record Review. His illustrious career includes 26 years as music director and conductor of The Mendelssohn Choir (1979-2005) as well as his position as the Paul Mellon University Professor of Music at Carnegie Mellon University. In addition, Page worked as Director of Special Projects and Choral Activities with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (1989-2005) and served with the Cleveland Orchestra (1971-1989). He has conducted many national radio and television broadcasts of this and many other major USA orchestras, including Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, Houston, Dallas, Louisiana, Milwaukee, Virginia, and San Antonio, as well as the opera companies of Cleveland, Kansas City, Toledo, and Opera Carolina and the Opera Theatre of Pittsburgh. He was the first conductor of the famed Berkshire Choral Festival and has returned eleven times.
In Europe, he has conducted the Royal Philharmonic Opera Orchestra (London) and the Luxembourg RTL Orchestra, the Czech State Philharmonic of Brno and the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra. He has performed throughout Europe in cities such as Prague, Vienna, Salzburg, Munich, Krakow and Budapest, and in 2001, Page conducted the Robert Page Festival Singers and the State Orchestra of St. Petersburg in Russia and Finland, followed by performances of the RPFS and the Halle State Philharmonic Orchestra in performances in Munich, Dresden, Leipzig and Berlin. Page was invited to return to direct the same forces in Halle, Germany; Geneva, Switzerland; Toulouse, France; and Barcelona, Spain.
Page's work can be heard on more than forty discs issued by Columbia, London, RCA, Telarc, and Decca. He has received Grammy awards for his recordings of Orff's Carmina Burana and Catulli Carmina, and has eight other Grammy nominations to his credit. He is also the recipient of the Grand Prix du Disc for Porgy and Bess and a Prix Mondial de Montreux for his world premier recording of the Shostakovich Symphony No. 13, Babi Yar.
Active in the national choral scene, Page has served on various panels of the National Endowment for the Arts. He is a founding member of Chorus America, and served as its president for three years. He has been the catalyst in the commissioning of major works of the twentieth century, and the chorus master for the Chicago Lyric Opera/La Scala production of Paradise Lost (Kristof Penderecki) at the composer's request.
