December 6, 2006
Elizabeth Schulze, Music Director of the Maryland Symphony Orchestra, Signs Four-Year Contract

Hagerstown, MD… The Maryland Symphony Orchestra Board of Directors has announced that Elizabeth Schulze, MSO Music Director, has extended her contract with the Orchestra through the 2011-12 Season. Brendan Fitzsimmons, MSO Board President, said that he was delighted that Ms. Schulze had decided to remain with the Orchestra as Music Director, a position she has held since 1999. “For the last several years the MSO and our community as a whole have been the beneficiaries of Elizabeth’s presence. In particular, she has been extraordinarily generous in giving of her time and talents in her work with our area’s schools. It is fitting that in this 25th Anniversary year that we ensure her continued presence in our community for the next several seasons.”

Andrew Kipe, Executive Director of the Maryland Symphony Orchestra, praised the Board for retaining the popular conductor. “I am delighted that the MSO Board of Directors has extended Elizabeth’s contract for four more seasons. In her tenure at the MSO she has raised the artistic quality of the orchestra to a first class level. The Maryland Symphony is very fortunate to have such a talented and dynamic Music Director at the helm and I am very fortunate to work with such a dedicated colleague.”

Ms. Schulze also expressed her satisfaction with the contract extension. “I am pleased and honored to be continuing my close relationship with this wonderful orchestra. I am proud of what we've achieved together over the past eight seasons and I look forward to fostering the orchestra's continued growth and further deepening the MSO's relationship with our community.”

Praised as "an ideal music director whose infectious energy is as contagious as her exuberant and thoroughly committed musicianship," MSO Music Director and Conductor Elizabeth Schulze has held the positions of Associate Conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra, Music Director and Conductor of the Waterloo/Cedar Falls Symphony Orchestra, and, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, Assistant Conductor of the Buffalo Philharmonic. Ms. Schulze also served as Music Director and Conductor of the Kenosha (Wisconsin) Symphony Orchestra and has been a conducting assistant and cover conductor for the New York Philharmonic.

Ms. Schulze has performed as guest conductor with numerous American orchestras and opera companies, including the Milwaukee, Colorado, North Carolina, New Haven, Madison, Eugene, Annapolis, Greenville, Omaha, Oregon, Stamford, Eastern Connecticut, Anchorage and National Symphonies, the American Composer’s Orchestra, Buffalo and Tulsa Philharmonics, Chicago Sinfonietta, Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, San Francisco Women's Philharmonic, Chicago Civic Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra and Philharmonia of the Manhattan School of Music, the Tulsa Opera Company, the Colorado Opera Troupe, and the Aspen Music Festival. She made her European debut leading the Mainz Chamber Orchestra for the opening concert of the Atlantisches Festival in Kaiserslautern, Germany, and appeared in Paris, London, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, and Vienna with the National Symphony. Ms. Schulze has also been a guest assistant conductor at the Paris Opera (Bastille) and at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Her recent guest appearances include the Shippensburg Summer Festival, two engagements with the Monarch Brass Ensemble, and debuts with both the Erie Philharmonic and the Hong Kong Philharmonic.

A strong advocate of music education, Ms. Schulze has led the American Composer's Orchestra in educational and family concerts in Carnegie Hall and throughout the five boroughs of New York City. While in Iowa, her innovative approach to educational programming led to interactive classroom broadcasts of educational concerts throughout the state over the fiber-optic network. She has performed as an artist-in-residence at Northwestern University, and has been a frequent guest conductor of the orchestras of The University of Maryland and the Manhattan School of Music. Ms. Schulze has conducted the All County High School Orchestra of Washington County for six years, and returned for a sixth year to teach at the National Symphony/Kennedy Center-sponsored National Conducting Institute. She was also once again engaged to teach and conduct at the NSO/Kennedy Center’s Summer Music Institute for gifted youth, a position she has held for seven of the last ten years.

An honors graduate of Interlochen Arts Academy and Bryn Mawr College, where she earned an A.B. cum laude in Philosophy, Ms. Schulze holds graduate degrees in Orchestral and Choral Conducting from SUNY at Stony Brook. The first doctoral fellow in Orchestral Conducting at Northwestern University, she was a Conducting Fellow at L'École d'Arts Americaines in France. Ms. Schulze has worked with Murry Sidlin, Lawrence Foster and Sergiu Commissiona, and was the recipient of the first Aspen Music School Conducting Award. As a Tanglewood Fellow she worked with Seiji Ozawa, Gustav Meier and Leonard Bernstein.

Elizabeth Schulze will lead the Maryland Symphony Orchestra during its annual holiday concerts on December 16 and 17. The MSO is currently celebrating its twenty-fifth season as the area’s premiere professional orchestra, dedicated to providing musical performances and programs that educate and entertain while enhancing the cultural environment of Western Maryland and the Quad-state region.