Joel Revzen

Maestro Joel Revzen is an award-winning conductor of symphony and opera, whose career has been truly international in scope.  Revzen joined the conducting staff of New York’s Metropolitan Opera in 1999 and remained involved for eight seasons, helping to prepare wide-ranging repertoire including Prokofiev’s War and Peace, Dvorak’s Rusalka, and Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier.

In 2003, Maestro Revzen was appointed General and Artistic Director of the Arizona Opera, a post he has held for 9 seasons.  In 2011, Maestro Revzen assumed the title of Principal Conductor, leading three productions each season for the company.  He has led over 150 performances of 27 productions of a vast variety of operatic repertoire that has featured such renowned artists as Stephanie Blythe, Dolora Zajick, Christine Brewer, Greer Grimsley, Nancy Gustafson, and Gordon Hawkins.

Recently, Maestro Revzen has been appointed Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Lake Tahoe Summerfest (http://tahoesummerfest.org), which had its inaugural this past summer 2012.    Lake Tahoe Summerfest presents symphonic and chamber music concerts with internationally prominent artists in the pristine setting of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

In the world of opera, Maestro Revzen has led productions with the National Theatre of Mannheim Germany, the Washington Opera at the Kennedy Center, Minnesota Opera, Hawaii Opera Theatre, the Norwegian Opera in Oslo, and numerous productions with the world-renowned Kirov Opera at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg, Russia when he performed a program of Leonard Bernstein the White Nights Festival.

In recent seasons, Maestro Revzen led productions of La Traviata with Opera Carolina; Menotti’s The Consul with Opera New Jersey; La Perichole with the New England Conservatory; Rigoletto with the Orlando Philharmonic; and for the Arizona Opera, their productions of Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci, Faust, Orfeo ed Euridice, Carmen, Otello, Pirates of Penzance and Abduction from the Seraglio.  He also made his debut leading a subscription program of Verdi, Mahler and Mendelssohn with the Phoenix Symphony.

This season he will make his debut leading a new production of Carmen for Theatre Erfurt in Germany, will conduct a concert performance with the Brubeck Brothers Quartet and the Russian National Orchestra, will return to the Orlando Philharmonic for a production of Le nozze di Figaro, and will lead Arizona Opera’s 2013 productions of Tosca, Il Trovatore and Le Nozze di Figaro.

In the Symphonic world, Maestro Revzen served as Assistant Conductor of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra from 1984-1989, a post to which he was appointed by violinist and conductor Pinchas Zuckerman, and was on the conducting faculty of the Aspen Music Festival from 1982 – 1991. Since that time, he has appeared as guest conductor with the Prague Symphony, Prague Chamber Orchestra, Janacek Philharmonic, Orchestra National de Lyon, Orchestra Capital de Toulouse, Philharmonic de Radio France, National Symphony Orchestra, Kennedy Center Chamber Players, Seattle Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, Florida Philharmonic, the National Arts Center Orchestra, and the Chamber Orchestra of San Remo, Italy among many others.

Maestro Revzen has an active recording career including two releases with the London Symphony Orchestra, Haydn’s Creation and The Seasons with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, in addition to the Grammy-award winning The Art of Arleen Auger on which he was both pianist and conductor. His recording of the Mendelssohn Double Concerto with the Moscow Symphony was released on Newport classics, as well as an all Libby Larsen recording with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and soprano Benita Valente for Koch Recordings.

During his 14-year tenure as Artistic Director of the Berkshire Opera he commissioned and produced the world premiere of Steve Paulus’ opera Summer, based on the Edith Wharton novella, and the critically acclaimed recording of Menotti’s The Consul.

In academia, Mr. Revzen served as the Dean of the St Louis Conservatory of Music from 1972- 1984, and was responsible for building that school from its inception from a student body of 11 students and a budget of $50,000 to a nationally recognized training institution of 120 student from 26 state and 13 foreign countries, with an annual budget of over $2.7 million dollars.