BIOGRAPHY

Gregory Buchalter is currently Music Director of Varna International and  Muzika! The Grand Strand Music Festival. He is a regular conductor with Florida Grand Opera where he has conducted Andre Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire, Jake Heggie’s Three Decembers and Tosca and will return this coming season for I Pagliacci. After having a sucessful debut at Vero Beach Opera with L’Elisir d’Amore, he will return this season for Don Giovanni. He also looks forward to a debut with the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra for Mozart’s Requiem. He has recently conducted Rigoletto with Opera Orlando, Don Giovanni and Hänsel und Gretel with Vienna Summer Music Festival, Il Barbiere di Siviglia with Pacific Northwest Opera, Idomeneo with New England Conservatory and concerts with the South Florida Symphony. He has been Artistic Director of Opera Fairbanks and Opera Las Vegas. In Fairbanks he has conducted La Boheme, Carmen, L’Elisir d’amore, Don Giovanni, Tosca, La Cenerentola, L’Italiana in Algeri, Hansel and Gretel, Magic Flute,  Pagliacci and concerts featuring Vivica Genaux. During his leadership with these companies, he has brought in many internationally renowned singers including Paul Plishka, Sondra Radvanovsky, Francisco Casanova, and Alessandra Marc. Maestro Buchalter is also an active symphonic conductor. He recently had a great successes in Fairbanks conducting Mahler’s Fourth Symphony and Bernstein’s West Side Story Symphonic Dances as well as a recent concert in Belgrade featuring the Sibelius Violin Concerto. With Varna International he recently conducted both Mozart and Verdi’s Requiems throughout Italy and the World Premiere of JAC Redford’s Second Symphony.

Maestro Buchalter has conducted Salomé at the Savonlinna Opera Festival in Finland with Maria Ewing and Helga Dernesch, Die Fledermaus at the Vienna Volksoper, and Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail at the Spoleto Festival, Eugene Onegin with the New Opera World Festival in Moscow, Così fan Tutte with the Mediterranean Opera Festival in Sicily, and at the Varna International Festival he has conducted Carmen, Suor Angelica/Gianni Schicchi, Così fan Tutte, Le Nozze di Figaro, L’enfant et les Sortilèges, La Rondine and the Bulgarian premieres of Kurt Weil’s Street Scene and Bernstein’s Candide. With Teatro Lirico d’Europa he has conducted  Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Rigoletto, La Boheme and Madama Butterfly.

Mr. Buchalter  conducted the American Premiere of Mercadante’s I Due Figaro, Von Winter’s Das Labyrinth, and Donizetti’s Olivo e Pasquale with New York’s Amore Opera and received glowing reviews for the performances. He was the first American to conduct with the Kazakhstan State Opera; the performances there included a televised Gala concert for the President of Kazakhstan. Mr. Buchalter has been Chorus Master of Santa Fe Opera, where he received great acclaim for his choral preparation for Peter Grimes, Turandot, and many other operas. In addition he was Chorus Master at the Bregenz Festival in Austria, Theater des Westens in Berlin, and the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.

Mr. Buchalter has been a cover conductor at the Metropolitan Opera where the position of “Maestro di Banda” was created for him. He has worked extensively with the Metropolitan Opera Chorus and has been Chorus Master at the Met for several productions including the telecast of Franco Zeffirelli’s production of Don Giovanni and Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. He has also prepared several world premiers at the Met: John Corigliano’s The Ghosts of Versailles, Philip Glass’ The Voyage, and John Harbison’s The Great Gatsby. In the latter, Mr. Buchalter created the on-stage part of the jazz band conductor.

Mr. Buchalter founded his own chorus, Choros Aristos, and led them in a performance of Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle at New York’s Merkin Hall in commemoration of the composer’s 200th birthday. Mr. Buchalter conducted the Metropolitan Consort, a group composed of members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in a highly successful concert of Baroque music. For many seasons he was a guest conductor with the New York Symphonic Arts Ensemble where he has conducted such works as Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky. As both pianist and conductor, Mr. Buchalter has toured such places as Cairo, Kuwait, Malaysia, Turkey, and Hong Kong. As a lecturer and speaker he has been invited to hold Master Classes throughout the United States.

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