The Shepherd School of Music
THOMAS HONG
Associate Conductor
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1129 Alice Pratt
Brown Hall |
Thomas Hong most recently concluded his third season as assistant conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, where he conducted numerous classical, community, education and pops concerts for the orchestra. Previously, he was also associate conductor with the Seattle Symphony, where he was in charge of programming and conducting all of the community outreach performances during the year. Other positions in the past include assistant conductor of Orchestre National de France, serving as cover conductor for various European tours, and also associate conductor of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, where his responsibilities were to program and perform all educational and outreach concerts, including four performances as part of Carnegie Hall’s “LinkUp!” music education program, serving all fourth grade students in the Fort Worth Independent School District.
Orchestras that Mr. Hong has conducted in the past include the Spokane, Richmond and Winnepeg Symphony Orchestras as well as the Seoul and Buffalo Philharmonics. Among his operatic and vocal performances are Copland’s The Tenderland, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde and Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress. His most recent operatic production was Donizetti’s L’exisir d’Amore at the Wortham Opera Theatre in Houston. Awards that he has received include the Leopold Stokowski Fellowship and the Whitaker Fund for Opera. Most recently, he was awarded the fellowship by the Brahms society of Baden-Baden offering residency for several weeks in the studio of Brahms' summer and only remaining home in Germany.
As an educator, Mr. Hong was on the faculty of The Shepherd School Pre-College at Rice University, teaching piano to young students. He was also a part of the Just for U Music Program (JUMP!) at the university, dialoging and interacting with children as well as performing for them. In 2006, he was an integral part of forming a new musical organization, working closely with the executive and artistic directors as the founding conductor. Based in Greenwich, Connecticut, Youth Symphony for United Nations or YSUN’s guiding principle continues to be ‘a gathering of sound for world peace.’
Thomas was born in Incheon, Korea and immigrated to the United States with his family in 1978. He began his musical training at the age of 15 on piano and continued his studies with Dr. Samuel Hsu at Philadelphia Biblical University. Later, he went on to earn a master degree in choral conducting at Temple University and an artist diploma in orchestral conducting from The Curtis Institute of Music, studying with Maestro Otto Werner Mueller. He concluded his artistic training with Maestro Larry Rachleff at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music.