Biography

Nathaniel Efthimiou is the Assistant Conductor of the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra & Music School and Assistant Professor of Music at Berklee College of Music. In March 2023, he was a semi-finalist in the 2nd Hong Kong International Conducting Competition and has been recognized with The Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award. In 2021, he was a quarter-finalist in the 2021 Donatella Flick Conducting Competition and was awarded the James Conlon Conducting Prize during his fellowship at the Aspen Conducting Academy in 2015.

 

In January 2022, he made a last-minute subscription debut with the Rhode Island Philharmonic, returning just 3 months later to conduct an American program of works by Gershwin, Price, and Gabriela Lena Frank. He has conducted the London Symphony Orchestra, Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Naples Philharmonic, Amarillo Symphony, and the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra. He has covered conductors such as Leonard Slatkin, David Robertson, and Bramwell Tovey. In 2017, he completed an Artistic Administration internship with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra, where he assisted newly appointed principal conductor, Robert Moody, and served as a member of the symphony’s artistic team. In the opera pit, he has participated in masterclasses with Nicolas McGegan and Patrick Summers, and he has assisted productions ranging from Debussy’s Pelleas et Melisande, Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, and Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore.

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Nathaniel is a passionate advocate for new music. In October 2018, he led four performances of Tom Cipullo’s provocative operetta, After Life, with the BU Opera Institute, and in August 2016, he rehearsed and conducted Flatline by Matthew Ricketts, 2016 Jacob Druckman Prize winner at the Susan and Ford Schumann Center for Composition Studies. In collaboration with the Boston University Center for New Music, Nathaniel has stepped in to rehearse works by both student and faculty composers such as Klaus Lang and 2019 Boston University Composition Competition winner, Patrick Walker. A composer himself, Nathaniel has studied with Joel Hoffman, David Ludwig, and Georg Tsontakis. His work has been featured in composition festivals such as the Atlantic Music Festival in Waterville, Maine, “UPBEAT” in Milna, Croatia, and WSKG’s television program, Expressions, in Binghamton, NY.

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Nathaniel’s mentors and teachers have included Bramwell Tovey, Robert Spano, and Larry Rachleff as well as Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Cristian Măcelaru, and Hugh Wolff. He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts from Boston University and a Bachelor of Music in Composition and a Master of Arts from the Greatbatch School of Music. Nathaniel currently resides in New England.