Gemma New, conductor

Sought after for her insightful interpretations and dynamic presence, New Zealand-born Gemma New is Music Director of the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra and Principal Guest Conductor of the Dallas Symphony. She is the recipient of the prestigious 2021 Sir George Solti Conducting Award.

In summer 2021, Ms. New led the New York Philharmonic’s 29th Annual Memorial Day Concert at St. John the Divine in a free performance livestreamed to the public. She made debuts at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and at the Aspen Music Festival and Grand Teton Music Festival. In Australasia, she debuted with the Sydney Symphony and led the New Zealand Symphony’s Winter Festival.

Ms. New’s 2021-22 season includes subscription appearances with the National Symphony, Montreal Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, Atlanta Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra and Kansas City Symphony. She makes debuts with WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, BBC Philharmonic, Hallé Orchestra, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestre national d’Île-de-France. She will debut with the Los Angeles Opera for the West Coast Premiere of Kevin Puts’ The Brightness of Light with soprano Renée Fleming and baritone Rod Gilfry.

The 2021-22 season marks Ms. New’s third season as Principal Guest Conductor of the Dallas Symphony. She will lead three subscription programs plus a New Year’s Eve concert in Dallas.

Ms. New recently completed a four-year position as Resident Conductor of the St. Louis Symphony. In her final season, she led its 2019-20 season-opening concerts and conducted a concert broadcast live with Chris Thile on the nationally syndicated variety show Live from Here.

A former Dudamel Conducting Fellow with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Ms. New previously served as Associate Conductor of the New Jersey Symphony and was a 2018 Conducting Fellow at Tanglewood Music Center. She holds a master of music degree in orchestral conducting from the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, where she studied with Gustav Meier and Markand Thakar. She graduated with honors from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand with a bachelor of music degree in violin performance.

Alisa Weilerstein, cello

“A young cellist whose emotionally resonant performances of both traditional and contemporary music have earned her international recognition, Weilerstein is a consummate performer, combining technical precision with impassioned musicianship,” stated the MacArthur Foundation, when awarding American cellist Alisa Weilerstein a 2011 MacArthur Fellowship. 

Ms. Weilerstein’s 2016-17 season includes, for the first time in her career, performances of Bach’s complete suites for unaccompanied cello at Caramoor, in Washington, D.C. and in London. In January she embarked on a nine-city U.S. tour with longtime recital partner Inon Barnatan and clarinetist Anthony McGill, including a concert in New York’s Alice Tully Hall and performances of a Joseph Hallman premiere composed for this trio. She tours Europe with Mr. Barnatan later in the spring, with stops in Salzburg and at London’s Wigmore Hall. Her busy international concert schedule this season features performances around the globe: she performs Britten’s Cello Symphony with the New World Symphony; Shostakovich’s First Cello Concerto with the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, the Netherlands Philharmonic and the National Symphony in both Washington, D.C. and Moscow; Prokofiev’s Sinfonia concertante with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic and the Dallas Symphony; Schumann with the San Francisco Symphony and at Carnegie Hall in the company of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, with which she then tours the same program to Italy and Spain; Elgar with the Staatskapelle Weimar; Walton with Amsterdam’s Residentie Orkest; and Dvořák with the Minnesota Orchestra, Sydney Symphony and Tokyo Symphony on a three-stop tour of Japan, where she will also play four solo recitals. She also performs Henri Dutilleux’s Tout un monde lointain… with Lisbon’s Gulbenkian Orchestra and gives the world premiere of Matthias Pintscher’s Second Cello Concerto, un despertar (an awakening), with the Boston Symphony, which co-commissioned the piece for her. 

As an exclusive Decca Classics recording artist, Ms. Weilerstein releases her fifth album in September, playing Shostakovich’s two cello concertos with the Bavarian Radio Symphony under Pablo Heras-Casado, in performances recorded live last season. Her discography also includes Dvořák’s Cello Concerto; Solo, her compilation of unaccompanied 20th-century cello music; and Elgar and Elliott Carter’s cello concertos with Daniel Barenboim and the Staatskapelle Berlin, which was named BBC Music’s 2013 Recording of the Year 2013. 

Ms. Weilerstein’s career milestones include an emotionally tumultuous account of Elgar’s Concerto with the Berlin Philharmonic and Barenboim in Oxford, England, and a performance at the White House for President and Mrs. Obama. An ardent champion of new music, she has worked on multiple projects with Osvaldo Golijov and Mr. Pintscher and premiered works by Lera Auerbach and Joseph Hallman. She appears at major music festivals worldwide, and regularly collaborates with Venezuela’s Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra and the El Sistema education program. 

Ms. Weilerstein, whose honors include Lincoln Center’s 2008 Martin E. Segal prize and the 2006 Leonard Bernstein Award, is a graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Music and Columbia University. Diagnosed with type-one diabetes, she is a Celebrity Advocate for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.

Chad Goodman, conductor

With a flair for inventive programming and a bold presence on stage and in the community, Chad Goodman has been praised for "bringing innovation to classical music" (Forbes).

As the Conducting Fellow of the New World Symphony, Mr. Goodman conducts on subscription, education, family and holiday programs. His program, “SPARK: How Composers Find Inspiration,” blended captivating light design and videography with engaging audience participation to explore how a composition is created and brought to life by an orchestra.

Since 2018 Mr. Goodman has served as an Assistant Conductor to the San Francisco Symphony, assisting Esa-Pekka Salonen, Manfred Honeck, Daniel Harding, Pablo Heras-Casado, Simone Young and James Gaffigan among others.

As Founder and Artistic Director of Elevate Ensemble, Mr. Goodman’s ambitious vision for concert programming resulted in the pairing of music from Bay Area composers with underappreciated gems of the 20th and 21st centuries. Under his leadership, Elevate Ensemble established a Composer-in-Residence program and commissioned fifteen works from Bay Area composers. Elevate collaborated with photographers, videographers, poets and culinary artists, bringing new music and vibrant multi-genre experiences to unique venues such as yoga studios, historic Victorian homes and art studio warehouses.

Mr. Goodman has previously served as Conducting Fellow of Festival Napa Valley, Music Director of the Contra Costa Chamber Orchestra, Conducting Fellow of the Atlantic Music Festival, and a rehearsal and cover conductor for the San Francisco Ballet.

In addition to his performing career, he teaches young musicians the business and entrepreneurial skills needed to successfully navigate the world as a working musician in his workshop “You Earned a Music Degree. Now What?”

Mr. Goodman holds a bachelor of music degree from the Eastman School of Music and a master of music degree from San Francisco State University. His mentors include Michael Tilson Thomas, Alasdair Neale, Cyrus Ginwala and Martin Seggelke.