Brendan Townsend

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Brendan Townsend is an internationally known conductor, educator and cellist.

He is the son of musician, educator and conductor Dr. Declan Townsend.

Appointed as Music Director of the Laredo Philharmonic Orchestra in 2003, Brendan Townsend has attracted widespread attention from the public, media, and professional music world for his extraordinary and diverse talents as a conductor. Winner of the “2007 ASCAP Award for Innovative Programming” presented by the League of American Orchestras, he is committed to expanding the concert experience for his audiences through creative programs, enhanced visual content and breaking down the barriers between stage and seats.

Growing up in Cork, Ireland he began his musical studies in cello and chamber music at a very young age at the Cork School of Music with cellist Gerard Kelly, and chamber musician Constantine Zanidache he earned his Diploma of the Cork School of Music in 1988. He further achieved a Licentiate Diploma in Cello Performance from Trinity College, London. He spent a year in Essen, Germany where he took cello lessons from Young Chang Cho at the Folkwang Academy before transferring to the Conservatorium voor muziek, Maastricht the Netherlands where he attained a Docerend Musicus diploma in cello and an Uitvoerend Diploma in conducting in 1994. He was a cello student of Mirel Iancovici and a conducting student of Jan Stulen.

He began his conducting career with the Cork Gilbert & Sullivan Society at age 18. He made his European debut with the Netherlands Promenade Orchestra before going on to conduct over 20 orchestras, choirs and opera companies in Europe. From 1995 – 1997 he was the Music Director for Sinfonietta Geleen and Ars Antiqua et Nova.

In 1997 he moved to the United States where he was Music Director of the Youth Orchestras of San Antonio and director of orchestras at the University of the Incarnate Word. In 2001 he became the interim Music Director of the Bryan Symphony Orchestra and Director of Orchestras at Tennessee Tech University. During his tenure at the Bryan Symphony Orchestra he was credited with increasing the orchestras’ visibility in the community, resulting in increased support and ticket sales.

In 2003 he was appointed to the Music Directorship of the Laredo Philharmonic Orchestra. He concurrently holds a shared teaching appointment at Texas A&M International University and Laredo Community College. Meanwhile, he also holds an appointment with the Corpus Christi Symphony Orchestra, and continues an extensive guest conducting career which has taken him to Florida, Georgia, both Carolinas, Tennessee, Kansas, Pennsylvania, California and he has upcoming engagements in Taiwan, and his native Ireland.

In 2004 he was invited to conduct performances by Laredo Musical Theatre International which has led to his being named Music Director. In September 2005 he took over as Music Director of the Laredo Philharmonic Chorale. In 2006 he was appointed Principle Guest Conductor of both the Corpus Christi Symphony Orchestra and the Kingsville Symphony Orchestra.

Brendan Townsend has been widely recognized for his adventurous and exciting programmatic ideas. His commitment to exploring new options for the “concert experience” include the institution of the “Music By Numbers” program at his concerts, post-concert discussion, and live interviews with living composers. Passionate about furthering the musical genre, Townsend includes a work by a living composer on every concert program, but strongly believes in choosing music that will speak directly to the hearts of his audience. In recent years his concert programs have included works by Marion Ingoldsby, Declan Townsend, Stephen Dankner, David Avshalomov, Bruce Craig Roter, Peter Boyer, Nancy Galbraith, Christoper Rouse, Henryck Gorecki, Mikolaj Gorecki, Yoshimatsui, Bezhad Ranjbaran, Roberto Siera, Ross Edwards, Heather Schmidt, and Lowell Lieberman.

His performances of standard classical and romantic repertoire have been hailed as "Splendid", "Enchanting" and of "taking the audiences to unknown heights of celestial bliss" (Laredo Morning Times [1]).