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Music Director
John Daly Goodwin
Over the last twenty-two seasons, John Daly Goodwin, Music Director, has led the New York Choral Society to new musical dimensions as he builds upon an honored fifty year tradition of choral excellence. His leadership and vision have made the New York Choral Society the artists of choice for the American Ballet Theatre, Richard Tucker Music Foundation, September Concert Foundation, and the Shanghai Symphony Broadcasting Orchestra. Under his direction, the New York Choral Society has performed in the People's Republic of China, the Czech Republic, Israel, Austria, France, Italy, and Greece.
Mr. Goodwin has conducted many performances to critical acclaim, including Mahler's Eighth Symphony, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, and the Requiems of Verdi, Mozart and Brahms. He has conducted more than ninety concerts around New York City, including thirty-one in Carnegie Hall and six at Lincoln Center, and nine international concert tours, conducting the Shanghai Symphony Broadcasting Orchestra, the Collegium Ducale in Venice, the Orchestre Symphonique Bell'Arte of Paris, and the Delaware Symphony Orchestra.
Mr. Goodwin has been selected to prepare choruses for such prominent conductors as Leonard Bernstein, Dennis Russell Davies, Asher Fisch, Yong Yan Hu, Yehudi Menuhin, Eve Queler, Julius Rudel, Gerard Schwarz, Leonard Slatkin, and Robert Spano. Beyond the concert stage, Mr. Goodwin has conducted or prepared choruses for seventeen national television broadcasts, including the 1998 Grammy Awards with Celine Dion, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation Gala, Today on NBC and several concerts featuring Andrea Bocelli.
In addition to his work with the New York Choral Society, Mr. Goodwin serves on the music faculty at New York University, where he teaches and conducts the Choral Arts Society. He has also led the Choral Society of the Hamptons, the Westchester Concert Singers, and the Richmond Choral Society in numerous concert series, achieving "triumphant" critical acclaim.
Within Mr. Goodwin's extensive repertoire, he has specialized in the music of twentieth-century American composers. More than half of his concert repertoire includes works by John Adams, Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, George Gershwin, Philip Glass, Charles Ives, Morton Lauridsen, Stephen Paulus, and Conrad Susa.
With a strong personal commitment to music education, Mr. Goodwin has done extensive volunteer work with young aspiring musicians. Through Young Audiences, Artsgenesis, and the New York Choral Society's Mini Maestros program, he has brought the gift of music to thousands of children in more than fifty New York City public schools.
Michael A. Ciavaglia
Assistant Conductor
Michael A. Ciavaglia is a committed to excellence in music education, choral and instrumental performance, and liturgical music. He received his Master of Music degree in choral conducting in 2006 from Temple University in Philadelphia and a B.A. in Music and Russian/Eastern European Studies in 2004 from Fairfield University in Connecticut.
He is currently conductor of the Fairfield University Orchestra, and is an Adjunct Professor in the department of Visual and Performing Arts at Fairfield, teaching music history and voice. Since 2006, he has served as Choir Director at the Orthodox Christian Church of Christ the Saviour in Paramus, NJ, where he first apprenticed as a liturgical musician. Mr. Ciavaglia has been Assistant Conductor of the New York Choral Society since the fall of 2006. He is a member of the American Choral Directors Association and the National Collegiate Choral Organization.
Dedicated to community choral singing, Mr. Ciavaglia has sung with the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia and the Mendelssohn Choir of Connecticut, as well as with the New York Choral Society, and has served for six years as Assistant Conductor and Administrator of the Summer Festival Chorus, Fairfield, Connecticut.. He has conducted the Yale Russian Chorus and Swedish Museum Singers and is sought widely as a diction coach in Russian, Ukrainian, and Church Slavonic.
During the 2008-2009 season, Mr. Ciavaglia conducted works of Haydn, Debussy, Leroy Anderson, and Eric Whitacre, among others, in performances throughout the tri-state area. In November 2008, he debuted as conductor of the New York Choral Society Chamber Singers.