Artists

• Christopher James Lees

  Conductor

  Christopher James Lees serves as resident conductor of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra and principal conductor of the Charlotte Symphony Youth Orchestra. In addition to conducting more than 50 performances a season, he has stepped in to conduct classical subscription concerts on four occasions, including a gala performance with Grammy Award–winning artist and jazz legend Branford Marsalis in May 2021.

  This season Lees makes his debuts with the New York Philharmonic and the New World Symphony. An active guest conductor, he has returned for performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Rochester Philharmonic, and the Houston, Detroit, Milwaukee, North Carolina, Portland, Winston-Salem, and Flint symphony orchestras. Additional engagements have taken him to the National Arts Centre Orchestra (Ottawa), Orchestra de Chambre de Paris, Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra, and Cabrillo Festival Orchestra, and to the Music in the Mountains Festival and Festival Internacional de Inverno de Campos do Jordão in Brazil.

  Only the second American Gustavo Dudamel Conducting Fellow with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Lees made his debut with that orchestra in April 2013 and returned for concerts in February 2015. He has served as an assistant conductor for some of the world’s leading conductors, including Dudamel, Paavo Järvi, Herbert Blomstedt, Leonard Slatkin, David Robertson, Robert Spano, Marin Alsop, Pablo Heras-Casado, Stéphane Denève, and Susanna Mälkki. After two summers of study with Robert Spano at the Aspen Music Festival, Lees was named winner of both the 2011 James Conlon Conducting Prize and the 2012 Aspen Conducting Prize, respectively. In 2013 Lees returned for a third summer as assistant conductor for the Aspen Music Festival and School. 

  An active pianist and equally comfortable in the opera pit, Lees has served as music director or assistant conductor for operas ranging from Verdi’s Aida, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and Britten’s Peter Grimes to Andriessen’s De Materie, John Harbison’s The Great Gatsby, and Rota’s Il Capello di paglia di Firenze. A dedicated advocate for the music of our time, Lees has premiered more than 150 works by a diverse range of artists and several Pulitzer Prize–winning composers, including John Adams, William Bolcom, John Corigliano, Jennifer Higdon, Joseph Schwantner, Steven Stucky, Caroline Shaw, Roger Reynolds, and Julia Wolfe.

  Learn more about Christopher James Lees

• Justin Jay Hines

  Host

  Percussionist, composer, and educator Justin Jay Hines has performed with the New York Philharmonic, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Moab Music Festival, Alarm Will Sound, and Chamber Music Society of Detroit. He has served as a New York Philharmonic Lead Teaching Artist in New York City and Japan since 1997, and in November 2022 makes his fourth appearance as host on the New York Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concert: The Firebird. Hines has also collaborated with The Juilliard School, St. Louis Symphony, New World Symphony, 92nd Street Y, Lincoln Center Education, Carnegie Hall, and the Caramoor Center for the Arts as a leader of aesthetic education experiences. His classical compositions have been performed by his group Classical Jam at venues throughout the United States and Asia. Currently he is a composition mentor for the New York Philharmonic Very Young Composers Program, and the artistic director of Living Arts Collaborative, Inc. He is a recipient of Manhattan School of Music’s Pablo Casals Award for Community Outreach, and joins the Manhattan School of Music faculty in the fall of 2022.

  
  Learn more about Justin Jay Hines

• Full Circle Souljahs

  Creative Partner

  Ana “Rokafella” Garcia director/choreographer
  Gabriel Kwikstep Dionisio dancer
  Frank Concepcion dancer
  Odylle Bgirl Mantis Beder dancer
  TJ Rocka James dancer
  TBC dancer
  TBC dancer
  

  
  

• Doug Fitch

  Stage Designer / Director

  Stage director and designer Doug Fitch has created productions for major opera houses around the world. With the New York Philharmonic he has collaborated on productions of Ligeti’s Le Grand Macabre, Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen, A Dancer’s Dream (presenting Stravinsky’s The Fairy’s Kiss and Petrushka), and HK Gruber’s Gloria — A Pig Tale, and directed and designed several NY Phil Young People’s Concerts and Very Young People’s Concerts. He directed Suzanne Farrin’s Dolce la Morte at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, commissioned by MetLiveArts, and his Tanglewood production of Elliott Carter’s What Next? was filmed and screened at the Museum of Modern Art. Fitch’s production of Orphic Moments (comprising works by Matthew Aucoin alongside Gluck) was featured at National Sawdust, Salzburg’s State Theater, and The Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Le Grand Macabre was remounted at the ElbPhilharmonie in Hamburg. Punkitititi, his devised show starring Geoff Sobelle, was commissioned by the Salzburg Marionette Theater and MozartWoche2020, and returned in 2021. 

  
  Learn more about Doug Fitch