FSYO Announces Matthew Davis, Incoming Philharmonia Conductor for 2014-2015 Season

We are thrilled to announce that Matthew Davis will take over for John Dupuis as the Philharmonia Conductor for our upcoming 2014-2015 season. Mr. Davis is the current FSYO Prelude Orchestra Conductor. 

More Information on Mr. Davis: 

Matthew Davis is currently Director of Strings at the Lois Cowles Harrison Center for the Visual and Performing Arts in Lakeland, Florida. In addition to conducting the Harrison Symphony and Chamber Orchestra, Mr. Davis also teaches music theory, music composition, and chamber music. Under his direction, the Harrison Symphony Orchestra was selected to perform at the 2007 Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago and the 2010 Festival des Anches in La Croix Valmer, France. Currently, Mr. Davis is on the faculty of the Florida State University Summer Music Camps, where he co-conducts the Symphony String, Guarneri and Chamber orchestras. An active All-County clinician, Mr. Davis has conducted middle school and high school honors orchestras in Tampa, Fort Myers, and Naples, Florida as well as San Antonio, Texas. Mr. Davis holds a Master of Music Education from Florida State University and a Bachelor of Music in cello performance from Indiana University.

Mr. Davis was recently awarded a Surdna Arts Teachers Fellowship to travel to the Netherlands to study Baroque cello at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. He has also been named Harrison School for the Arts Teacher of the Year for 2011-12. Previously, Mr. Davis served as Director of Orchestras at Denton High School in Denton, Texas, during which time his orchestra was named first runner-up in the Texas Honor Orchestra Competition. In 2004, Mr. Davis was presented with the Marjorie Keller Young Teacher Award by the Texas chapter of the American String Teachers Association.

As a cellist, Mr. Davis has studied with Lubomir Georgiev, Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi, Helga Winold, Nathaniel Rosen, and Richard Aaron and served as the assistant principal cello of the Tallahassee Symphony. He performed on tour with the American Russian Young Artists Orchestra in the United States, Russia, Hungary, and the Czech Republic, and in chamber music programs at the Encore School for Strings, the Quartet Program, and the Chautauqua Institute. Mr. Davis is a member of the American String Teachers Association and the Florida Music Educators Association. He currently serves as the All-State Music Committee Chair and District 12 Chair for the Florida Orchestra Association.