Conductors

  •   Christopher Warren-Green, Music Director

    • Warren-Green's sensitive interpretation and poised command has earned him the greatest respect throughout the music-making world. Music Director of the Charlotte Symphony, other key dates in North America have included Minnesota Orchestra and The Philadelphia Orchestra, Washington's National Symphony Orchestra, as well as the Saint Louis, Houston, Milwaukee, Seattle and Vancouver symphony orchestras. This season sees him make his debut with Toronto Symphony Orchestra and return to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra for the third consecutive season.
       
      Also Music Director and Principal Conductor of the London Chamber Orchestra, recent highlights in Europe have included the world premiere of Frank Corcoran's Violin Concerto with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra Dublin, and concerts with the Orchestra I Pomeriggi Musicali, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestre National de Belgique, with whom he is a regular collaborator. Elsewhere, he has worked with Royal Scottish National, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Iceland Symphony and Sapporo Symphony orchestras, as well as the Zürcher Kammerorchester. In 13/14, he also works with Beethoven Orchester Bonn for the first time, and returns to Philharmonia Orchestra and the KBS Symphony Orchestra.
       
      A regular on the summer festival scene, Warren-Green performed with the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Lichfield Festival and at the Sewanee Summer Music Festival in Tennessee in 2013. Previous summer festival engagements have included the Boston Summer Arts Weekend Festival, Three Choirs Festival 2012 with the Philharmonia Orchestra, the International Music Festival 'Chopin and his Europe' with Sinfonia Varsovia and the Enescu Festival.
       
      Warren-Green has been personally invited to conduct on many occasions for the Royal Family in the last thirty years. In April 2011, Warren-Green conducted the London Chamber Orchestra during the marriage ceremony of HRH Prince William Duke of Cambridge and HRH Duchess of Cambridge at Westminster Abbey, which was televised to millions worldwide. Other notable occasions have included Her Majesty the Queen's 80th birthday celebrations at Kew Palace and HRH Prince of Wales' 60th birthday concert.
       
      Previous orchestral appointments have included Principal Conductor of the Camerata, resident orchestra of the Megaron Athens and Chief Conductor of both the Nordiska Kammar Orkestern and Jönköpings Sinfonietta. Warren-Green has recorded extensively for Sony, Phillips, Virgin EMI, Chandos and Deustche Grammophon, and also records with the London Chamber Orchestra for Signum Classics.
       
      Warren-Green makes his home in Charlotte, North Carolina with wife, violinist Rosemary Furniss and son, Jamie.


  • Scott Allen Jarrett, Director of Choruses and Assistant Conductor

    • Scott Allen Jarrett is Music Director of the Oratorio Singers of Charlotte, the official chorus of the Charlotte Symphony. A resident of Boston, Jarrett travels to North Carolina weekly for rehearsals with the Oratorio Singers, preparing and leading the chorus for their appearances with the Symphony throughout the season.

      In Boston, Dr. Jarrett serves as Director of Music at Boston University's Marsh Chapel, where his appointment includes faculty posts in the School of Theology and in the School of Music. Also in Boston, he is the Music Director of the Back Bay Chorale, one of New England's leading volunteer choruses.

      With the Oratorio Singers, and his ensembles in Boston, Dr. Jarrett will lead performances  during the 2010-2011 season of Haydn's Die Schöpfung, Schumann's Das Paradies und die Peri, the Howells Requiem, Messiah, the Rachmaninoff Vespers, and the Verdi Requiem. Regarded for his interpretations of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, Dr. Jarrett will conduct performance of cantatas 34, 170, 171, 62, the Orchestral Suite in B Minor, the Christmas Oratorio, and the St. Matthew Passionthis season in Boston.

      A native of Virginia, Scott Allen Jarrett holds degrees from Furman University (Greenville, SC) and Boston University, where he received his masters and doctoral degrees in conducting. As a pianist, Jarrett accompanied rehearsals for the late Robert Shaw during his Boston visits, and served as rehearsal accompanist for the Carnegie Hall Choral Workshop  with Charles Dutoit. He is a member of the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus, and a frequent keyboard collaborator with Miami-based Seraphic Fire.


  • Ernest Pereira, Charlotte Symphony Youth Orchestras Music Director

    • The Symphony Guild of Charlotte Endowed Chair and Conductor of the Charlotte Symphony Youth Orchestras, Dr. Ernest Pereira has vigorously improved and expanded the two ensembles over the past twenty years, leading the CSYO in performances at Charlotte's Festival in the Park and Summer Pops at Symphony Park, as well as the prestigious venues of Piccolo Spoleto in Charleston, SC, and Carnegie Hall in New York, NY. He has guest conducted the Charlotte Civic Orchestra and has appeared on several local chamber music series as either a violinist or conductor. For a number of years, Dr. Pereira was featured at the Charlotte Symphony's annual Youth Festival, conducting the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra as well as the combined professional and youth orchestras.

      He currently co-directs, with Dr. Paul Nitsch, the Fun with Chamber Music program for youth at Queens University of Charlotte. Students from his orchestra and private teaching studio have gone on to major in music at noted conservatories and universities, including the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Juilliard School, University of Texas at Austin, the Yale School of Music, the Peabody Institute at the Johns Hopkins University, Oberlin College, North Carolina School of the Arts, UNC-Chapel Hill, and Vanderbilt University.

      A native of South Africa, Dr. Pereira received his early training in violin in Pretoria from Walter Mony and Alan Solomon and holds Teacher and Performer Licentiates from the University of South Africa. He studied in this country with David Cerone, graduating as valedictorian from the Cleveland Institute of Music with a Bachelor of Music degree in 1981 and a Master of Music degree in 1982. He received his Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Texas in 1987, studying with Vincent Frittelli. Dr. Pereira served as Concertmaster of both the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra as well as the University of Texas Orchestra and conducted the University of Texas String Project Orchestra. Since 1985, Dr. Pereira has been a member of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared frequently as a soloist and chamber musician in the United States, South Africa, and Namibia and has soloed with the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra and the Charlotte Civic Orchestra. He believes strongly in educating young musicians and maintains an active and successful violin studio.

  •   Albert-George Schram, Guest Conductor

    • Albert-George Schram returns for his thirteenth season to conduct the Charlotte Symphony. In addition, he has led the Symphony's highly acclaimed Summer Pops at SouthPark in June of each summer since 2001 and opened the Symphony's new permanent summer home at Symphony Park in June 2002.

      Under his leadership, the Charlotte Symphony has collaborated with such outstanding musical artists as Art Garfunkel, Johnny Mathis, Tony Bennett, Dianne Reeves, Olivia Newton-John, Bernadette Peters, José Feliciano, the Four Tops, Kathy Mattea, the United States Naval Academy Men's Glee Club, Michael Feinstein, The Temptations, and the late Ray Charles.

      Schram, a native of the Netherlands, has served as the Nashville Symphony's Resident Conductor since the 2006- 07 opening season of the Schermerhorn Symphony Center. He is responsible for programming and guest artist selection for the Bank of America Pops series, as well as building and maintaining that series' audience base. In addition, he leads select classical, education, and other special concerts throughout the season.

      He also has served as Staff Conductor of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra in Ohio since 1979 and has become an audience favorite for all series, including Classical subscriptions, Pops, and summer season concerts.

      Schram was Music Director and Conductor of the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra from 1994 to 2000. From 1990 to 1996, Schram served as Resident Conductor of the Louisville Orchestra, and he was appointed Resident Conductor of the former Florida Philharmonic Orchestra beginning with the 2002/03 season.

      In 2008 Schram was invited to conduct the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional of Bolivia in La Paz and the Orquesta Sinfónica Universidad Nacional de Cuyo in Mendoza, Argentina. Other foreign conducting engagements have included the KBS Symphony Orchestra in Seoul in live televised concerts, Korea's Taegu Symphony Orchestra, and the Orchestra der Allgemeinen Musikgesellschaft Luzern in Switzerland, among others. He has made return appearances in his native Holland to conduct the Netherlands Radio Orchestra and the Netherlands Broadcast Orchestra.

      In the United States, his guest appearances include the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Spokane Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic, Nashville Symphony, Shreveport Symphony, San Antonio Symphony, Lubbock Symphony, Allentown Symphony, Mansfield Symphony, and Ballet Metropolitan, among others.

      Schram's studies have been largely in the European tradition under the tutelage of Franco Ferrara at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, Italy; Rafael Kubelik in Luzern, Switzerland; Abraham Kaplan in Seattle, Washington; and Neeme Järvi in Hilversum, Netherlands. He received the majority of his initial training at the Conservatory of The Hague in the Netherlands. He later moved to Canada to undertake studies at the Universities of Calgary and Victoria. His training was completed at the University of Washington where he earned the Doctorate of Musical Arts. During his studies, he frequently conducted the orchestral, festival, and choral ensembles of those universities.

      Schram resides in Florida with his wife Debbie and their children Natalia, Galen, and Gabriel. And please call him George!

  •   Roger Kalia, Assistant Conductor

    • Winner of the 2013 Solti Foundation US Career Assistance Award, Roger Kalia is currently in his first season as Assistant Conductor of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra.  In this position, he will conduct a variety of concerts including the orchestra's "Lollipops" series, On Campus and Education concerts while covering all classical subscription concerts for Maestro Christopher Warren-Green and guest conductors.
       
      As a recipient of the BMI/Lionel Newman Conducting Scholarship and YMF Conducting Grant, Mr. Kalia is entering his second season as Music Director of the Young Musicians Foundation Debut Orchestra of Los Angeles.  Winner of YMF's 2012 National Conductor Search, he follows in the footsteps of such illustrious conductors as Michael Tilson-Thomas, Andre Previn, and Myung Whun Chung.  Highlights of his first season included two world premieres, a fully-staged production of Stravinsky's Histoire du Soldat with actor Jack Black at the LA County Museum of Art as part of their "Sundays Live" series, a unique multimedia presentation and performance of Ravel's Mother Goose Suite and the orchestra's debut performance at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Angels "Virgin of Guadalupe" Celebration, which was televised and streamed worldwide.
       
      Roger is also entering his fourth season as Music Director of the Lake George Music Festival, a summer music festival that brings together musicians from such orchestras as the Atlanta Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Kansas City Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic and the country's premier conservatories.  In addition, Roger has been invited to serve as cover conductor with the St. Louis Symphony and served as an adjudicator in the classical instrumental division for the 2013 Spotlight Awards at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. 
       
      Mr. Kalia made his subscription debut with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra in October 2011 after winning Second Prize in their inaugural International Conducting Competition.  In recent seasons he has worked with orchestras and ensembles across North America and Europe including the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, Cabrillo Festival Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra de Cadaqués, Orchestra of Colours (Greece), Columbus Symphony Orchestra, Manhattan School of Music Symphony, Aspen Music Festival Orchestra, New York Youth Symphony, Festival Orchestra of Sofia, Houston Ballet Academy, Chelsea Symphony, Psappha New Music Ensemble, Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic Orchestra, among others.  Additional collaborations include violinist Bing Wang of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, actors Jack Black and Michael Lerner, and upcoming performances with violinist Glenn Dicterow of the New York Philharmonic and pianist Misha Dichter.   
       
      Mr. Kalia was chosen by former New York Philharmonic Music Director Kurt Masur to participate in his weeklong Conducting Seminar at the Manhattan School of Music in January 2013.  He was also personally selected by David Zinman to conduct the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich as part of his 2011 International Conducting Masterclass at the Zurich Festspiele.  In 2011 Mr. Kalia was also awarded a Bruno Walter Conducting Scholarship to attend the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music where he studied with Marin Alsop and Gustav Meier.  In 2010 Mr. Kalia was a Conducting Fellow at the American Academy of Conducting at the Aspen Music Festival, where he studied with Robert Spano, Hugh Wolff, and Larry Rachleff.
       
      A native of New York, Mr. Kalia recently completed his work as a Doctoral Conducting Fellow and Associate Instructor of Orchestral Conducting at Indiana University, where he studied with David Effron and Arthur Fagen.  From 2007-09, he was the Schissler Conducting Fellow at the University of Houston, where he earned his Master's in Orchestral Conducting and was inducted into the Pi Kappa Lambda Music Honor Society. 

      For more information, please visit www.roger-kalia.com


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