The Italian/American conductor, Anthony Armoré, is an active freelance conductor with opera companies and symphony orchestras worldwide. Since 2001, and in conjunction with Maestros Jorma Panula and Gheorghe Stanciu, he has produced a number of Masterclasses for conductors on the orchestral music of Jean Sibelius, Carl Nielsen and Johannes Brahms and essential operas from the standard repertoire: La traviata, Il trovatore, Rigoletto, Carmen, Il barbiere di Siviglia, Un ballo in maschera, Lucia di Lammermoor, La Boheme and Nabucco.

Between 2001 and 2004 Mr. Armoré was the associate director/conductor with Opera Constanta in Constanta, Romania. Constanta is also the home of the Filarmonica Marea Neagra (Black Sea Philharmonic), where he was artistic adviser and a frequent guest conductor between 2001-2003.

Prior to beginning his work with the Opera Constanta, Maestro Armoré was the music director/conductor of the Portland Chamber Orchestra (Oregon, USA). There he conducted the standard repertoire as well as contemporary music and chamber opera. Upon his appointment as the orchestra's director in 1997, he inaugurated a series called "Composers of Oregon" and embarked on a cycle of music by that state's most important composers. These composers typically attended rehearsals and spoke to audiences before performances. His chamber opera activities there brought rarely-staged works by Haydn and Mozart to the public in critically-acclaimed performances (fully-staged and sung in Italian).

In 1990, Anthony Armoré founded two American musical organizations that, under his leadership and direction, have been remarkably successful: the Ernest Bloch Music Festival; and the Yaquina Orchestra (now the Newport Symphony Orchestra), both based in Newport, Oregon. As artistic director of the Ernest Bloch Music Festival, Maestro Armoré favored programming that blended standard repertoire with contemporary music (many works were commissioned for the Festival). As music director of the Yaquina Orchestra (1990-1997), Armoré built a superb orchestra that quickly became the cultural cornerstone of the region. During the same decade, he was first the assistant and later associate conductor of the Columbia Symphony Orchestra (Portland, Oregon) -- an orchestra that specialized in larger symphonic repertoire.

Trained as a conductor, violinist, French hornist, pianist, and music theorist, Maestro Armoré studied conducting with such notable artists as Jorma Panula of the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland; Charles Bruck at the Domaine School for Conductors and Orchestral Players in Hancock, Maine; and Elizabeth Green of the University of Michigan.

In May of 1997, Mr. Armoré recorded a CD with the Slovak Sinfonietta for Disques VDE-GALLO Records of Lausanne, Switzerland. The CD, titled RETURNS: Pacific Northwest Composers from Europe, features the music of Ernest Bloch, Tomas Svoboda and Klaus Cornell, and was released internationally in September of 1999.

Mr. Armoré may be contacted regarding conducting engagements (either orchestral or operatic) via e-mail at: AArmore@yahoo.com.