Michael Slon

Active as a conductor of choral, orchestral, and operatic repertoire, Michael Slon is currently Conductor of the University Singers, Chamber Singers, and a professor on the music faculty at the University of Virginia, where he also guest conducts the Charlottesville & University Symphony Orchestra. He also serves as Interim Music Director of the Oratorio Society of Virginia. In 2006-2007, he was named a member of UVa's Mead Honored faculty, an award recognizing outstanding faculty mentors. Recent repertoire with the choruses has included Orff's Carmina Burana, Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, Bach's Mass in B minor, Mozart's Mass in C minor, Britten's Hymn to St. Cecilia, and a range of shorter a cappella and accompanied works. After substituting on one hour's notice for a January 2005 performance of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 1, Mr. Slon also served for a year as Interim Director of the Charlottesville & University Symphony Orchestra (CUSO), leading performances of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra, Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 2, Mahler's Symphony No. 4, Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, and Copland's Appalachian Spring. He also co-launched the University Singers-CUSO Family Holiday Concerts, now a beloved Charlottesville tradition, since 2005.

Opera and musical theatre engagements have included a production of Stephen Paulus's The Three Hermits with Buffalo's Opera Sacra, regional premieres of Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George and Guettel's The Light in the Piazza with the Heritage Theater Festival, South Pacific and The Magic Flute with the Ash Lawn Opera Festival, and Into the Woods and Bernstein's Mass at Indiana University. In addition, he is active as a guest conductor for honors choruses and orchestras.

Prior to UVA, Mr. Slon served as visiting conducting faculty at the Oberlin Conservatory, and as assistant conductor of Cincinnati's May Festival Chorus, in which roles he prepared and co-prepared choruses for concerts with the Cleveland Orchestra and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. His ensembles have worked with artists including Moses Hogan, Bobby McFerrin, Meredith Monk, and Franz Welser-Möst, and have been involved in commissioning projects with composers Stephen Paulus and Eric Whitacre. Mr. Slon holds degrees from the Indiana University School of Music and Cornell University, where he was named a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and he recently participated in the Oregon Bach Festival conducting masterclass, where he studied with Helmuth Rilling and other distinguished musicians. He is also a pianist and writer - his first book Songs from the Hill- A History of the Cornell University Glee Club out in 1998, and he is currently at work on a Leonard Bernstein project.