Festival Napa Valley's Joel Revzen Conducting Fellow Announced

American conductor Kyle Dickson is the 2023 recipient of the fellowship awarded annually to a promising young conductor

The Joel Revzen Conducting Fellowship is a yearly intensive summer residency and career development grant awarded by Festival Napa Valley in memory of conductor Joel Revzen, who passed away in 2020 from complications with COVID-19.

As the 2023 Fellow, American conductor Kyle Dickson will also receive many performance opportunities. On July 14, 2023, Dickson will lead Festival Orchestra Napa for the opening night of its 17th season and for its season finale concert on July 23, 2023.

He will conduct works by Joaquín Rodrigo, Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky, and emerging composer Yang Bao, featuring guitarist Pablo Sáinz Villegas and pianist Alexander Malofeev as soloists.

Dickson has been a Salonen Conducting Fellow with the San Francisco Symphony and received guidance from conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen through the Negaunee Conducting Program at Los Angeles’ Colburn Conservatory.

An orchestral conducting graduate of Northwestern University studying with Victor Yampolsky, Dickson also received degrees in violin performance from Michigan State University and DePaul University.

He currently serves as assistant conductor of the Inner City Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles and was previously music Director of Chicago’s South Loop Symphony. He also gives masterclasses at various arts programs including the Chicago Youth Symphony Ensembles and Ravinia’s El Sistema program.

In 2021, Dickson was a fellow at the National Orchestral Institute’s Conducting Academy, and from 2019, was a Project Inclusion Freeman Conducting Fellow with Chicago Sinfonietta. His mentors included Marin Alsop, James Ross, and Mei-Ann Chen.

Additionally, he has held residencies at Indiana University-South Bend and the United World College of South East Asia as a chamber musician.

His other accolades include the Richard S. Weinert Award from Concert Artists Guild, the Grant Park Music Festival Advocate for Arts Award, and first prize at the 2010 NANM National Concerto Competition.

To apply for the 2024 Joel Revzen Conducting Fellowship, click here.

The fellowship was created in honor of Joel Revzen who spent 20 years at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. He was a faculty member of the Blackburn Music Academy and led students in a variety of performances and masterclasses.