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Director of Bands |
Employment/Education
Steven D. Davis is the Director of Wind Ensembles, Associate Professor of Conducting, and conductor of the Conservatory Wind Symphony at the Conservatory of Music and Dance at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. He is also the conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of the Youth Symphony of Kansas City. He is conductor of newEar - Kansas City's professional contemporary chamber ensemble and also is music director and conductor of UMKC's new music ensemble Musica Nova. He coordinates the graduate program in wind ensemble conducting and guides all aspects of the UMKC band program. He is the founding director of the UMKC Wind Band Teaching Symposium, held each summer on the campus of the Conservatory. For the five years prior to joining the faculty at UMKC he was the Associate Director of University Bands at the University of Michigan where he was responsible for overseeing the undergraduate instrumental conducting curriculum, served as the conductor of the Concert Band, and was the original coordinator of the summer conducting symposium - Energize. His primary teacher was Craig Kirchhoff and he considers H. Robert Reynolds, James Croft, Frederick Fennell, Joseph Kreines and Michael Haithcock additional significant mentors.
2007-2008
In 2007 - 2008, Davis will conduct in Powell Symphony Hall in St. Louis alongside David Robertson of the St. Louis Symphony. He will conduct James Mobberley's Vox Inhumana (2005) and Elliott Carter's Tempo e Tempi (1999) at the 2008 Festival of New American Music in Sacramento, California. Additionally, he will host a 2008 regional conference of the CBDNA in Kansas City and will again host the 2008 summer conducting symposium that had conductors from 23 states attend in its inaugural year. Davis will conduct the premiere of two instrumental works by James Mobberley and Paul Rudy. He will also make appearances as a conductor in Canada, Iowa, California, North Dakota, Virginia, Texas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Kansas, Missouri, Arizona, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and Florida. The Conservatory Wind Symphony under his leadership is honored by its acceptance to perform at the Missouri Music Educators State Conference in January of 2008.
Music Education
Proudly committed to music education and the mentoring of instrumental music educators and students (he taught in the public schools of Florida for six years), Davis has presented lectures, conducted ensembles, and evaluated performances in over 30 states and abroad. Some of these invitations have included presentations or performances at the Midwest International Band and Orchestra Clinic, MENC National Convention, Interlochen Summer Arts Camp, CBDNA National Convention, and numerous state conferences.
Acclaim
Davis has been praised for performances by some of today's most significant living composers such as Michael Colgrass, John Corigliano, Steven Stucky, Chen Yi, Michael Daugherty, Verne Reynolds, Leslie Bassett, Samuel Adler, Robert Linn, and Frank Ticheli, and is a proponent for new literature within the wind ensemble community. He has been awarded honorary lifetime memberships in the Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association, Phi Mu Alpha and Tau Beta Sigma fraternities. The University of Michigan Band Alumni Association recently named Davis a 'true son of Michigan.' Davis has published with Carl Fischer Inc. His proudest professional achievement is the renaming in his honor the instrumental rehearsal hall at Cypress Creek High School in Orlando, Florida - a gift from his former high school students.