Music Director and Conductor, Western Piedmont Symphony (NC)
Music Director and Conductor, Western Piedmont Youth Symphony (NC)
John Gordon Rossis completing his 18th season as Music Director and Conductor of the Western Piedmont Symphony in Hickory, NC. His first orchestral conducting opportunities came as Assistant Conductor of the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra (1972-74) the Canton Symphony Orchestra and Youth Symphony (1974-75) and the Cleveland Philharmonic Orchestra (1973-1979). In recent years he has returned to Ohio to lead the Cleveland Philharmonic Orchestra, the Lima Symphony, and the Blue Ash Symphony. He served as Music Director and Conductor of the Kingsport (TN) Symphony Orchestra from 1981-1991. He is a frequent clinic and festival conductor in North Carolina, and has led both student orchestras at the Eastern Music Festival.
Born in Selma, Indiana in 1951, John Gordon Ross received a B.M. from Ball State University and a M.M. from Northwestern University and also attended the Cleveland Institute of Music. His conducting teachers were Robert Hargreaves, Thomas Briccetti, and Walter Hendl. He also benefited from the knowledge and experience of long-term mentor Robert Marcellus, former Principal Clarinetist of the Cleveland Orchestra. He has also been a participating conductor in the master classes of Pierre Boulez and Victor Yampolsky.
He is still active as a trombonist and is the 2nd Trombonist of the Lakeside (OH) Summer Symphony and also regularly performs in North Carolina. He has taught instrumental conducting at Middle Tennessee State University and Lenoir-Rhyne University as a guest faculty member and taught other courses at King College in Bristol, TN. Currently he is an adjunct faculty member at Lenoir-Rhyne University where he is conducting choral ensembles during the spring semester. He held the title of Artist-in-Residence at Cleveland State University from 1977-79.
He is also a devotee of music of our time having led numerous world premieres with his orchestras. He is also recognized as an advocate of the music of African-American composers. He received one of the initial Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson Travel to the Collections Grants from the Center for Black Music Research and presented a paper on orchestral repertoire at their 2008 National Convention in Chicago.
