Maestro Andrew Kurtz enters his thirteenth season as Music Director and Conductor of the Gulf Coast Symphony, a vibrant community orchestra in Lee County, Florida. He was recently named the 2007 Angel of the Arts Performing Artist of the Year. He is also the founder and General & Artistic Director of the Center City Opera Theater, a professional opera company in Philadelphia, where he has led performances of Don Pasquale, La Boheme, Don Giovanni, and La Traviata ('00 &'05), Amahl & the Night Visitors, Rigoletto,  Lucia di Lammermoor, I Pagliacci, Cosi fan tutte, Madama Butterfly, L’Elisir d’amore, and Le Nozze di Figaro.  Kurtz's repertoire encompasses a wide range of musical styles from baroque to contemporary, and multiple genres including opera, symphonic, ballet, musical theater, jazz, cantorial and symphonic pops.

Founding Music Director of the five-year-old Florida Jewish Philharmonic Orchestra,  he is developing one of only two orchestras of its kind in the USA dedicated to performing music of Jewish composers and on Jewish themes, as well as keeping alive the Cantorial and Yiddish musical traditions.  Kurtz is also the tour conductor for CANTORS: A Faith in Song, featuring three of the world's leading Cantors, Alberto Mizrahi, Naftali Herstik and Benzion Miller.

 

Kurtz served on the Board of the Conductors Guild, and was editor of their quarterly newsletter, Podium Notes. An avid arts education, Maestro Kurtz is Resident Music Director of the Jr. Session of the Luzerne Music Center.  He is also Producing Artistic Director of  Synergy Productions, a professional theater company in Lee County, Florida.

 

Kurtz's 2007-08 season includes concerts with the Gulf Coast Symphony, the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra and the Florida Jewish Philharmonic.  He will lead new productions of  Cosi fan tutte, L'Elisir d'amore, Madama Butterfly, Il Trovatore, Werther, Samson & Delilah, Carmen and the world premiere of The Always Present Present commissioned by the Center City Opera Theater.

Kurtz's 2006-2007 season included eleven concerts with the Gulf Coast Symphony, a return appearance with the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra, performance of Puccini's Tosca (November'06) and performances of Hansel & Gretel, Romeo & Juliet, Macbeth, and the regional premieres of Floyd's Of Mice & Men and Adamo's Little Women with the Center City Opera Theater. In June 2007 he will led the world premiere of the chamber orchestra version of Lowell Liebermann's The Picture of Dorian Gray.

 

In previous seasons Kurtz's has conducted the Gonzaga Symphony Orchestra (Spokane, WA) and the International Master Musicians Orchestra. In 2004 Kurtz made his New York City conducting debut with the Metropolitan Repertory Ballet, conducting a jazz ballet Sinatra & Swing at the TRIBECA Performing Arts Center in June.  

 

In September 2001 Kurtz won First Prize in the Accademia Dell’Arte di Firenze International Conducting Competition and made his European conducting debut with the Dell’Arte Symphonietta in Florence, Italy.  

In August 1995 Kurtz made his international operatic conducting debut in Tel Aviv while working as staff conductor at the Israel Vocal Arts Institute. In April 1997 he conducted the Metropolitan Opera Guild's Opera Educational tour production of The Best of Puccini. A scholarship conducting student at the prestigious Aspen Music Festival in 1997, Kurtz conducted four concerts, including a concert version of Puccini's La Boheme. Highlights of other conducting posts to his credit include work with the Metropolitan Opera Guild, The Pennsylvania Opera Theater, The Pennsylvania Ballet, the Ash Lawn-Highland Opera Festival, the Charlottesville and University Symphony Orchestra, the Charlottesville/Albemarle Youth Orchestra and the Ocean City Pops.

 

As an educator Kurtz participated in an new educational initiative by the New York Philharmonic and worked with Arts for Anyone, an arts education program in the Philadelphia, New York, and New Jersey area.  He taught a highly successful classical music seminar series and oversees the Gulf Coast Symphony’s Musical Gateways education program.  During his three year tenure at The Pennsylvania Opera Theater he was actively involved in their extensive arts education programs.

Kurtz completed his Doctoral studies in conducting at the Peabody Conservatory and is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Virginia where he received his Master's degree in Music History and a Bachelor of Arts in music and drama.            

 

Updated: April 2007