MASSAPEQUA PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
CONDUCTORS

DAVID LEIBOWITZ, Principal Conductor

David Leibowitz, Principal Conductor of the Massapequa Philharmonic Orchestra since 2004, has led concert, opera, and ballet performances throughout North America and Europe, with such ensembles as the Pleven (Bulgaria) Philharmonic, the Orchester Pro Arte (Vienna), The Masterplayers Orchestra (Switzerland), the Orquestra Sinfonico de la Ciudad de Mexico, the Illinois Valley Symphony Orchestra, the Bach Festival Orchestra (Princeton, NJ), and the Brooklyn Opera and Dance Theater. In the New York area, he has conducted the Greenwich Village Orchestra, Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra, Centre Symphony Orchestra, Gemini Youth Orchestra, and “Music at St. Paul’s” (at Columbia University). Mr. Leibowitz is the Music Director of the highly acclaimed New York Repertory Orchestra and is on the conducting staff of the Rome Festival (Italy), leading opera, ballet, and concert performances. He is also a member of the conducting staff and faculty of the International Opera Institute at the Maud Powell Music Festival. Mr. Leibowitz received his MA from the City University of New York’s Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College. His main studies were in performance and musicology where he was awarded a teaching fellowship and named a Presidential Scholar of the University. His conducting studies were with Herbert Blomstedt, Carlo Maria Giulini, and Jacques-Louis Monod, among others. Mr. Leibowitz was a finalist in the International Masterplayers’ Conducting Competition in Lugano, Switzerland in 1986.

ZACHARY SCHWARTZMAN, Guest Conductor  

Zachary Schwartzman, a native of Cooperstown, NY, started to study piano when he was 14 years old. He earned undergraduate degrees in East Asian Studies and Piano Performance from Oberlin College and the Oberlin Conservatory, and was awarded a Master of Music in Orchestral Conducting from the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston. He received a career development grant from the Bruno Walter Memorial Foundation in 2004. That same year, he joined the roster of conductors at the New York City Opera as Associate Conductor for Le Nozze di Figaro, and held that position the following season for The Mines of Sulphur. Mr. Schwartzman has been Assistant Conductor for eight productions at the Glimmerglass Opera, and has been a member of their music staff since 2003 . He has received credit as Assistant Conductor on opera recordings released by Naxos and Chandos Records for Hartke’s The Greater Good and Bennett’s The Mines of Sulphur. As conductor, his orchestral performances have been featured on NPR, including a national broadcast on “Performance Today”. He has conducted around the United States, as well as in England, Brazil, and Bosnia.

HOWARD CINNAMON, Guest Conductor

Howard Cinnamon received his Bachelor's Degree from City College, his Masters from Queens College and his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. As a music scholar and theorist he has presented papers on the music of Brahms, Liszt, Schoenberg, Stravinsky and Tchaikovsky at numerous scholarly conferences, and has had his articles on Liszt, Schoenberg, Bach, and Chopin published in the journals, Music Theory Spectrum, Theory and Practice, In Theory Only, Indiana Theory Review and Intégrale and Gamut. He is currently Associate Professor and Coordinator of Music Theory at Hofstra University and was Chair of its Department of Music from 2001-2010.
Dr. Cinnamon has served as the Music Director and Principal Conductor for several community and university orchestras throughout Long Island. He has been Music Director of the Island Symphony Orchestra since 1992, served as Principal Conductor of the Long Beach Symphony from 1993-96, and was the Music Director of the BAFFA (Bay Area Friends of the Fine Arts) Symphony from 1997-2008. Dr. Cinnamon has also served as interim Director of the Hofstra University Orchestra and Conductor of the Hofstra Summer Reading Orchestra.

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