Brevard Music Center Orchestra and Chorus
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor
Yo-Yo Ma, cello
Reginald Smith, Jr., baritone
David Gresham, chorus master
WILLIAM WALTON Belshazzar’s Feast
ANTONIN DVOŘÁK Cello Concerto
Legendary cellist Yo-Yo Ma joins the Brevard Music Center Orchestra for our season finale.
Conducted by Giancarlo Guerrero, the program features Dvořák’s radiant Cello Concerto and Walton’s electrifying Belshazzar’s Feast—bringing instrumental and vocal forces on stage together in a powerful celebration of orchestral and choral grandeur.
Giancarlo Guerrero
Conductor
Giancarlo Guerrero is a six-time GRAMMY® Award–winning conductor whose “curatorial and interpretive creativity” (Chicago Tribune) and electrifying musicianship have earned him a place among today’s...
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Giancarlo Guerrero is a six-time GRAMMY® Award–winning conductor whose “curatorial and interpretive creativity” (Chicago Tribune) and electrifying musicianship have earned him a place among today’s most compelling artistic leaders. He is Music Director of the Sarasota Orchestra and Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of Chicago’s Grant Park Music Festival, where critics have praised his invigorating artistic vision. Guerrero also serves as Music Director Laureate of the Nashville Symphony, following a transformative sixteen-year tenure during which he championed American composers, premiered nearly two dozen works, and released twenty-four recordings that garnered thirteen GRAMMY® nominations and six wins.
Guerrero’s 2026–27 season includes a return to the San Francisco Symphony and guest appearances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the symphonies of Oregon, Baltimore, and Indianapolis. International engagements include Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, Brussels Philharmonic, Frankfurt Museumsorchester, and the New Zealand Symphony, among others. His past collaborations span the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, London Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, and many of the leading orchestras of Europe, North America, and Australia.
Born in Nicaragua and raised in Costa Rica, Guerrero is a passionate advocate for youth music education and has worked with the Curtis Institute of Music, Colburn School, The Juilliard School, NYO2, Yale Philharmonia, and the Nashville Symphony’s Accelerando program.
Yo-Yo Ma
Cello
Yo-Yo Ma’s multi-faceted career is testament to his belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works for cello,...
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Yo-Yo Ma’s multi-faceted career is testament to his belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding.
Whether performing new or familiar works for cello, bringing communities together to explore culture’s role in society, or engaging unexpected musical forms, Yo-Yo strives to foster connections that stimulate the imagination and reinforce our humanity.
Most recently, Yo-Yo began Our Common Nature, a cultural journey to celebrate the ways that nature can reunite us in pursuit of a shared future. Our Common Nature follows the Bach Project, a 36-community, six-continent tour of J. S. Bach’s cello suites paired with local cultural programming. Both endeavors reflect Yo-Yo’s lifelong commitment to stretching the boundaries of genre and tradition to understand how music helps us to imagine and build a stronger society.
Yo-Yo Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris, where he began studying the cello with his father at age four. When he was seven, he moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his cello studies before pursuing a liberal arts education.
Yo-Yo has recorded more than 120 albums, is the winner of 20 Grammy Awards, and has performed for nine American presidents, most recently on the occasion of President Biden’s inauguration. He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of the Arts, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Birgit Nilsson Prize. He has been a UN Messenger of Peace since 2006 and was recognized as one of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2020.
Reginald Smith, Jr.
Baritone
Reginald Smith, Jr., is a GRAMMY and Emmy Award-winning baritone, lauded as a “passionate performer” (The New York Times) with a voice that is “electric,...
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Reginald Smith, Jr., is a GRAMMY and Emmy Award-winning baritone, lauded as a “passionate performer” (The New York Times) with a voice that is “electric, hall-filling” (The Baltimore Sun), and “one of the most exciting baritone sounds to come along in years” (Opera News).
Smith’s 2025-2026 season featured his Carnegie Hall debut in Carlisle Floyd’s The Pilgrimage as well as house and role debuts at Seattle Opera as the Pirate King in Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance; at Minnesota Opera as Tonio in Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci; and with the Oakland Symphony in his first Verdi Requiem. He appeared at the Houston Grand Opera for his role debut as Peter in Hänsel und Gretel and in the title role in Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the Windsor Symphony Orchestra. In concert, he returned to the Phoenix and Dallas Symphony Orchestras for special holiday performances.
In recent seasons, Smith made debuts with the Washington National Opera, Baltimore Symphony, and Sacramento Philharmonic. Throughout his operatic career, Smith has performed with leading companies worldwide, including the Metropolitan Opera—where he won a 2021 GRAMMY Award for Best Opera Recording for his house debut in 2019—as well as the Dallas Opera and Hong Kong Opera.
Born in Atlanta, Smith is a Grand Finals winner of the 2015 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a graduate of the Houston Grand Opera Studio, among many other accolades.
David Gresham
Chorus Master
David Gresham serves as Director of Choral Activities at Brevard College. He is a frequent guest clinician with choirs of all age ranges, and he enjoys helping singers work toward a vibrant and healthy vocal tone while exploring the musical demands of choral literature.
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David Gresham serves as Director of Choral Activities at Brevard College. During his tenure, he has greatly increased participation in the choirs and has overseen a significant influx of voice majors at the College.
He is a frequent guest clinician with choirs of all age ranges, and he enjoys helping singers work toward a vibrant and healthy vocal tone while exploring the musical demands of choral literature. In Brevard, he also serves as Artistic Director and Conductor of the Transylvania Choral Society, Minister of Music at the Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd, and chorus master with the Brevard Music Center. Dr. Gresham has composed, edited, and arranged several pieces for choir. In addition to his conducting and composing, Dr. Gresham is an active singer and studio teacher.