Gesture and Style in Romantic-Era ConductingRegistration is Now Open!
New Haven, CT | January 9-10, 2027
_{A conducting masterclass and intensive for musicians to expand their gestural and interpretive range}

January 9, 2027: Evening Lecture
January 10, 2027: Workshops and Masterclasses
New Haven, Connecticut
Led by Mark Bailey and Kevin SherwinCollaborating organizations: American Baroque Orchestra, The American Romantics, Yale Collection of Historical Sound Recordings

Scroll down for the full description!Participant: $200
Auditor: $100Participants will conduct a live period-instrument string quartet in masterclass style sessions.Open to musicians and conductors of all backgrounds and experience levels, including collegiate, graduate, and emerging professional conductors, as well as instrumentalists and leader-instrumentalists.Prior conducting experience is welcome but not required.We're especially interested in musicians with strong ears and stylistic fluency who are motivated to extend that sensibility to the podium.For experienced conductors, this workshop integrates performance practice research directly into conducting technique, offering new interpretive and gestural tools for a variety of experience levels.Auditors are welcome to observe all sessions without conducting.Questions? Email us at [email protected]. Following your application or registration, you will receive a confirmation email from us.

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January 9-10, 2027
Greater New Haven, CT | January 9–10, 2027
A conducting masterclass and intensive for musicians to expand their gestural and interpretive range

How does a conductor, standing silently in front of an orchestra, actually shape the flexible tempo, phrasing, and expressive nuance heard on early sound recordings?Gesture and Style in Romantic-Era Conducting is a hands-on intensive built around that question: translating the shaping of tempo flexibility, phrasing, articulation, and the essential stylistic tools that characterize Romantic-era performance practices into clear, practical, communicable gesture. Participants work directly with a live string quartet to develop this vocabulary themselves, learning to invite this style of playing from an ensemble rather than imitate a historical performance.

Drawing on evidence from early sound recordings, silent conducting footage, and nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century conducting and vocal treatises, the workshop reconstructs specific technical tools, from cueing tempo changes within the beat itself, to coordinating with a soloist's individual phrasing, that shaped orchestral performance in this era, and that are rarely addressed in modern conducting training.Led by Mark Bailey (Artistic Director, American Baroque Orchestra; Laurence C. Witten II Curator, Yale Collection of Historical Sound Recordings) and Kevin Sherwin (Principal Conductor, The American Romantics), the workshop brings together performance practice research and conducting into sessions and masterclasses designed to develop your skills in conducting Romantic-era music.

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Faculty

Mark Bailey, Artistic Director, American Baroque Orchestra - Laurence C. Witten II Curator, Yale Collection of Historical Sound RecordingsAs a conductor, Mr. Bailey is extensively involved in the performance practice of baroque, classical, and romantic era musical works, with special emphasis on the repertoire of Eastern Europe. As director of the Yale Collection of Historical Sound Recordings, Mr. Bailey often is invited to give seminars on performance practice, conducting technique, Slavic baroque music, and the musical significance of early sound recordings, which he has at the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center, the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute in Toronto, Canada, the University of Oregon, Indiana University, the University of Surrey, the University of Oxford, among others. Other guest appearances include conducting two gala concerts by invitation at Carnegie Hall, featuring the music of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Mark Bailey's recordings have been acclaimed by The New York Times critics’ choice list and praised by National Public Radio’s Performance Today. He has guest conducted ensembles including Portland Baroque Orchestra, Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, Cappella Romana, Pro Coro Canada, and others. As a baroque violist, Mr. Bailey has played in the Musica Vera Duo with Kevin Sherwin, include sold-out concerts at the University of Cambridge. Recent recordings as artistic director of the American Baroque Orchestra include “Little Liberia: Music from Their Front Porch” and “Memories of Eastern Europe.” Their recent album, “Melodrama,” features 19th century works performed through the exploration of Romantic-era performance practices.

Kevin Sherwin, Artistic Director The American Romantics - Associate Artistic Director, American Baroque OrchestraMr. Sherwin infuses his active concert schedule with scholarly work in performance practice, focusing on orchestral styles of the Romantic-era. He recently debuted at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall conducting the Mahanaim Orchestra, and has performed as guitarist at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the University of Cambridge Summer Music Festival, La Grua Center, and others. Along with co-founding The American Romantics, he serves as Associate Artistic Director of the American Baroque Orchestra. He has presented his scholarly work at the University of Oxford, the Jacobs School of Music, the Mannes School of Music, the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, and others. As well, he has written articles on performance practice for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Charles Ives Society, and the Yale Collection of Historical Sound Recordings. His recent release with The American Romantics, "Goldmark's The Queen of Sheba Suite,' was featured in Classical Music UK, KBACH Radio, and on public television stations across the country, including BRIC Media (NYC) and CCTV (Cambridge). He is an Associate Fellow at Timothy Dwight College, Yale University.

Open to musicians and conductors of all backgrounds and experience levels, including collegiate, graduate, and emerging professional conductors, as well as instrumentalists and leader-instrumentalists.General questions? Email us at [email protected]Participant: $200
Auditor: $100Sign up below!

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