B.M. cum laude, University of New Hampshire
MM, Peabody Conservatory of Music, Johns Hopkins University
Director of Orchestras and Professor of Conducting since 1995, Kenneth Kiesler is founder and director of the Conductors Retreat at Medomak and Conductor Laureate of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra where, as Music Director from 1980 to 2000, he founded the Illinois Symphony Chorus and Illinois Chamber Orchestra, led debuts at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall, and won several awards. Since the summer of 2006, at the invitation of Music Director Pinchas Zukerman, he has been Director of the Conductors Programme of Canada's National Arts Centre. In 2007, he was named Director of the Vendome International Academy of Orchestral Conducting in France. Kiesler also leads masterclasses and courses for the Philharmonisches Kammer Orchester Berlin and Deutsches Musikrat in Germany. His students have won major international competitions such as the Maazel/Vilar and Nicolai Malko Competitions, and hold positions with major orchestras, opera companies, and music schools. Kiesler is a member of the visiting artist faculty of the Manhattan School of Music and has led many master classes for the ASOL and Conductors’ Guild, at Oxford University and Royal Academy of Music in London.
He was the recipient of the 1988 Helen M. Thompson Award, presented by the American Symphony Orchestra League to the outstanding American Music Director under the age of 35. He was an honored participant in the Leonard Bernstein American Conductors Program and conducted the Ensemble Intercontemporain in sessions with Pierre Boulez at Carnegie Hall. At the 1986 Stokowski Competition, he was awarded the Silver Medal by Maurice Abravanel, and special recognition for best performance of Appalachian Spring, by Morton Gould.
Kiesler has conducted National Symphony at the Kennedy Center, the Chicago Symphony, L'Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, the orchestras of Utah, Detroit, New Jersey, Florida, Indianapolis, Memphis, San Diego, Albany, Virginia, Omaha, Fresno, Long Beach, Long Island, Portland, Jerusalem, Haifa, Osaka, Puerto Rico, Daejeon and Pusan in Korea, the New Symphony Orchestra in Bulgaria, Hang Zhou in China, and at Meadowbrook, Skaneateles, Sewanee, Breckenridge, and Aspen. His operatic conducting includes Bright Sheng’s The Silver River in Singapore, and Britten's Peter Grimes and Rossini’s Il Turco in Italia at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis. His many dance performances include Appalachian Spring with Martha Graham, and Cinderella with the Indianapolis Ballet.
Kiesler's performances are heard on a dozen recordings on the Naxos and Equilibrium labels, with the BBC in London, Third Angle, the University Symphony Orchestra and the University Opera Theatre. He has led premieres by Evan Chambers, Steven Stucky, Gunther Schuller, Leslie Bassett, Ben Johnston, Aharon Harlap, Gabriela Lena Frank, Steven Rush and Paul Brantley. He conducted the first performance since 1925 of Gershwin's original jazz-band score of Rhapsody in Blue, the U.S. premiere of Mendelssohn's Third Piano Concerto, the world premiere of James P. Johnson's The Dreamy Kid and the first performance since 1940 of Johnson's blues opera, De Organizer.
His teachers include Carlo Maria Giulini, Fiora Contino, Julius Herford, Erich Leinsdorf, John Nelson, and James Wimer. He is included in Jeannine Wagar's book, Conductors in Conversation: Fifteen Contemporary Conductors Discuss Their Lives and Profession, andShostakovich Reconsidered by Allan Ho. Early in his career he was Assistant Conductor of the Indianapolis Symphony, Music Director of the South Bend Symphony and Principal Conductor of the Congress of Strings and the Saint Cecilia Orchestra where his “Tribute to Shostakovich” and national broadcasts brought widespread acclaim. Kenneth Kiesler is a trained wilderness guide and occasionally leads expeditions in the wilderness areas of Maine.
