CHRISTOPHER KENDALL | Conductor & Producer

Christopher Kendall is dean emeritus and professor at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance. From 2005 through 2015 he was the school’s dean, responsible for launching numerous initiatives; for strengthening the diversity of the faculty, staff, and student body; for the funding and design of a $30M expansion/renovation of the music building; for launching the interdisciplinary enterprise ArtsEngine and its national initiative a2ru (Alliance for the Arts at Research Universities); and, before completing his second term, bringing the school to 80 percent of its $90M capital campaign goal. In Washington, in addition to his work with 21st Century Consort, he is founder, co-director, and lutenist of the Folger Consort, ensemble-in-residence at the Folger Shakespeare Library since 1977. The ensemble has toured and recorded extensively, and has recently produced its fourth in a series of collaborations with British actor Sir Derek Jacobi, in performances at the Globe Theatre in London, in California’s Napa Valley, and at Strathmore Hall and the Kennedy Center. Mr. Kendall served as director of the University of Maryland School of Music from 1996 to 2005 during a period of rapid development at the school and its move to the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. Associate conductor of the Seattle Symphony from 1987 to 1992, and director of the Music Division and Tanglewood Institute of the Boston University School for the Arts from 1993 to 1996, Mr. Kendall has guest conducted many orchestras and ensembles in repertoire from the 18th to the 21st centuries. His recordings can be heard on the British ASV, Arabesque, Bard, Centaur, Delos, Innova, Nonesuch, and Smithsonian Collection labels.