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Music, like all art, engages the mind and the heart.

The mission of the Bard College Conservatory of Music is to provide the best possible preparation for a person dedicated to a life immersed in the creation and performance of music.

More About Us
  • Visiting Bard
    Interested in visiting Bard for a campus tour or performance? 
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A singer in front of an orchestra in Olin Hall
Photo by Karl Rabe

Offering Unique Undergraduate and Graduate Programs

  • Undergraduate Double Degree in Liberal Arts and Music Performance (BA and BM)
  • Graduate Degree in Vocal Arts (MM)
  • Graduate Degree in Conducting (MM)
  • Graduate Degree in Instrumental Studies (MM)
  • Master of Arts in Chinese Music and Culture (MA)
  • Advanced Performance Studies 
  • Postgraduate Collaborative Piano Fellowship
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The Bard Conservatory also offers a Preparatory Division for students ages 3–18.

News

A professional photo of Composer in Residence Missy Mazzoli.

Composer in Residence Missy Mazzoli Profiled in the New York Times

“We want the field to expand,” said Mazzoli, “and so bringing in [diversity] helps the field survive and thrive.”
 

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a man in a black t-shirt stands in front of a hallway of gothic stone arches

James Bagwell Named Principal Conductor of the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra and Berkshire Bach Society

Bagwell was recognized by both organizations for the role he has played over the past two decades in creating a consistent record of excellence in choral performance.

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a man conducts an orchestra

US-China Music Institute's Conference on Chinese Music in the West Featured in China Daily 

The three-day program brought together renowned guzheng masters from China, musicians from across North America, and young student performers for a gathering of artistic exchange, collaboration, and performance.

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Meet Our Faculty

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  • Leigh Mesh
    Double Bass Masterclasses

    Leigh Mesh

    Leigh Mesh, associate principal double bass, joined the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in 1993. A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, he began his professional career with the Columbus Symphony Orchestra and later played with the Indianapolis and Chicago Symphony Orchestras. He has taught master classes at the New World Symphony in Miami, Cincinnati Conservatory, Juilliard School, and Manhattan School of Music. Mr. Mesh is the double bass coach of the UBS Verbier Festival Youth Orchestra in Verbier, Switzerland. He has been a guest artist with the Verbier Festival, Linton Chamber Music Series, Pensacola Classicfest, Chamber Music Society of Martha’s Vineyard,Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego, and the Salt Bay Chamberfest. Mr. Mesh has performed with the MET Chamber Ensemble, the Caramoor Virtuosi, and the Brentano and Tokyo String Quartets. Mr. Mesh was a faculty member of the Colburn School of Music in Los Angeles during the 2009–2010 school year. He joined the faculty of the Bard College Conservatory of Music in the fall of 2010. He lives with his wife, Nancy Wu, associate concertmaster of the MET Opera Orchestra, and their two children, Guinevere and Wolfram, in Pleasantville, New York. He pursues cycling and skiing whenever he can. Mr. Mesh is an exclusive artist for Thomastik-Infeld Strings.
  • Yi-Wen Jiang
    Violin

    Yi-Wen Jiang

    Violinist Yi-Wen Jiang was born in Beijing to a family with a strong musical background, his father having spent over 35 years as a Concertmaster and his mother as a soprano soloist. Jiang's destiny was revealed at three years old when he listened to Beethoven's violin concerto, instilling in him the desire to become a professional violinist.

    Jiang gave his concerto debut in Beijing at 17. He secured the top prize at the inaugural China Youth Violin Competition, enabling him to study with Professor Han Li at the Central Conservatory of Music. Subsequently, he received a full scholarship from McDonnell-Douglas at the St. Louis Conservatory and relocated to the U.S. in 1985 to study with Taras Gabora and Michael Tree. Following his tenure in St. Louis, he enrolled in Rutgers University's graduate program, where he studied for four years with Arnold Steinhardt. Jiang credits Steinhardt with having the most profound influence on his playing, followed

    by highly influential master classes with Pinchas Zukerman. In the wake of his prize-winning performance at the Montreal International Competition, he appeared as a soloist with the Victoria Symphony and Montreal Symphony, and was featured at numerous international music festivals by the age of 22.

    Jiang's 26-year tenure with the Shanghai Quartet, which began in 1994, encompassed over 3,000 concerts in 37 countries. The ensemble's collaborations with distinguished artists were extensive, including performances with the Tokyo, Juilliard, and Guarneri Quartets, cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Lynn Harrell, pianists Roth Laredo, Menahem Pressler, Peter Serkin, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Yuja Wang, many of whom developed into lasting friendships. The ensemble was a regular performer at many of Europe's and North America's most prestigious music festivals.

    As a composer, Jiang has developed a distinctive style, arranging dozens of pieces for violin-piano and string quartet that blend Eastern and Western influences. His arrangement of Chinese folk songs, ChinaSong, is particularly notable, drawing on his childhood experiences during the Cultural Revolution in China. The Shanghai Quartet, joined by Eugenia Zukerman, recorded this collection of 24 pieces, which was released on the Delos International label in 2002. In 2018, Flower City Publisher in Guangzhou published 38 of these arrangements. 

    Jiang holds a position as a founding faculty member at The Bard College Conservatory of Music.
  • David Sytkowski
    Aural Skills, Undergraduate Vocal Coaching, Undergraduate Opera Workshop

    David Sytkowski

    David Sytkowski, pianist and vocal coach, is a Visiting Artist in Residence at Bard College, where he is Director of Music for Opera Workshop, coaches singers, teaches private piano, and teaches Aural Skills.



    In September 2019, he made his Joe’s Pub debut in Under The Influence with legendary cabaret artist Justin Vivian Bond. This led to Auntie Glam’s Happy Hour, a weekly livestream during the initial COVID-19 shut down that New York Times critic Zachary Woolf proclaimed one of “The Best of the Year’s At-Home Divas” in December 2020.



    As principal music coach for the Bard SummerScape festival for six years, he has prepared Korngold’s Die tote Stadt and Das Wunder Der Heliane, Rubenstein’s Demon, Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Tsar’s Bride, Dvorak’s Dimitrij, Mascagni’s Iris, Smyth’s The Wreckers, and Weber’s Euryanthe.



    Other recent engagements include the New York premiere of Gregory Spears’s Fellow Travelers for the PROTOTYPE festival in January 2018, Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein’s The Mother of Us All for the reopening of the Hudson Opera House in Fall 2017 with R.B. Schlather, Berkshire Opera Festival’s inaugural production of Madama Butterfly, Hindemith's The Long Christmas Dinner and Von Schillings's Mona Lisa with American Symphony Orchestra. He frequently appears as a symphony pianist and collaborator at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Weill Recital Hall, Jazz at Lincoln Center and the Fisher Center for the Performing Arts.
  • Christopher H. Gibbs
    James H. Ottaway Jr. Professor of Music; Faculty, Bard College Conservatory of Music; Artistic Codirector, Bard Music Festival

    Christopher H. Gibbs

    Christopher H. Gibbs is executive editor of The Musical Quarterly; editor of The Cambridge Companion to Schubert (1997); author of The Life of Schubert (2000), which has been translated into five languages; coeditor of Franz Liszt and His World (2006) and Franz Schubert and His World (2014); and coauthor of The Oxford History of Western Music, College Edition (2013; 2nd ed., 2018). He is a contributor to New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 19th-Century Music, Schubert durch die Brille, Current Musicology, Opera Quarterly, and Chronicle of Higher Education. Additionally, he has served as program annotator and musicological consultant to the Philadelphia Orchestra (2000– ); musicological director of the Schubertiade at the 92nd Street Y in New York City; musicological adviser for the Schubert Festival at Carnegie Hall (1997); and artistic codirector of the Bard Music Festival (2003– ). Gibbs is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Dissertation Prize of the Austrian Cultural Institute (1992), ASCAP–Deems Taylor Award (1998), and American Council of Learned Societies fellowship (1999–2000). He previously taught at SUNY Buffalo (1993–2003). BA, Haverford College; MA, MPhil, PhD, Columbia University. At Bard since 2002.
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Bard College
Bard College
Conservatory of Music
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All photos by Karl Rabe unless stated otherwise.