Bard Conservatory of Music News Archive

James Bagwell has taught at Bard College since 2000, where he is the chair of the undergraduate Music Program and codirector of the Graduate Program in Conducting.

He maintains an active schedule throughout the United States as a conductor of choral, operatic, and orchestral music. In 2009 he was appointed music director of The Collegiate Chorale and led the ensemble in concerts at Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall during the 2009–10 season. He is the principal guest conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra in New York, and since 2003 has been director of choruses for the Bard Music Festival, conducting and preparing choral works during the summer festival at Bard College. He has also prepared The Concert Chorale of New York for performances with the American Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Mostly Mozart Festival (broadcast nationally in 2006 on Live from Lincoln Center), all in Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. Bagwell has trained choruses for a number of major American and international orchestras, including the San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, NHK Symphony (Japan), St. Petersburg Symphony, Budapest Festival Orchestra, and Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, among others, and has worked with noted conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Michael Tilson Thomas, Leon Botstein, Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Robert Shaw. He holds degrees from Birmingham-Southern College, Florida State University, and Indiana University.