Musicians / Music Director

Peter Rubardt / Music Director

Completing his eleventh acclaimed season as Music Director of the Pensacola Symphony Orchestra, PETER RUBARDT is one of the most consistently hailed American conductors of his generation.

In addition to regular appearances on the Pensacola Symphony Orchestra's Classical and Pops series, Peter Rubardt is director of the orchestra's educational programs.  During his tenure, he is credited with significantly raising the orchestra's artistic level, as well as nearly doubling its performance schedule. By initiating a Pops series and adding a series of Sunday matinees, the PSO has greatly increased its audience base.

Prior to his appointment in Pensacola, Peter Rubardt served four seasons as the Associate Conductor of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra, which followed three seasons as Resident Conductor of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. He conducted numerous subscription and Pops performances, educational programs and regional tours with both orchestras, and led the New Jersey in a highly praised evening of operatic favorites at Ireland’s Adare Festival. He has also conducted the Utah Symphony, Louisiana and Rochester Philharmonic Orchestras, The Louisville Orchestra, Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, The Richmond Symphony, Japan's Hiroshima Symphony Orchestra, Century Orchestra Osaka and Kansai Philharmonic Orchestra and Nova Filarmonia Portuguese, with which he toured Portugal several times, as well as the orchestras of Acadiana, Anchorage, Annapolis, Bangor, Lubbock, Peoria, South Dakota and Spokane. He has also conducted The Nutcracker for Kaleidoscope & Ballet Pensacola and Northwest Florida Ballet. From 1991-1996, he served as Music Director of the Rutgers Symphony; during the 2002-2003 season, he was Principal Guest Conductor of Pensacola Opera.

A native of Berkeley, California, Peter Rubardt holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Orchestral Conducting from The Juilliard School, where he was the recipient of the Bruno Walter fellowship. A Fulbright scholar in 1984, he studied piano and conducting at the Vienna Academy of Music, and pursued further studies at the Tanglewood Music Center and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute. He has participated in the masterclasses of Leonard Bernstein, Seiji Ozawa, André Previn and Herbert Blomstedt, and his major teachers have included Otto-Werner Mueller, Sixten Ehrling, Michael Senturia and David Lawton.

Peter Rubardt has served on the faculties of The Juilliard School and the State University of New York at Purchase. He has received awards and degrees in music from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and the University of California at Berkeley. He has recorded for Pantheon Records International.

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