Female Conductors

Born to a music instructor father, French composer and conductor Nadia Boulanger was no stranger to music as a kid. The first woman to conduct prime orchestras, she had the who’s who of the music industry, such as Elliott Carter, Roy Harris, and Quincy Jones, on her list of students.

Born to an unwed mother in the Netherlands, Antonia Brico later moved to the US with her foster parents. She was the first American to graduate from the master class of conducting at the Berlin State Academy of Music. She was also the first woman to gain respect as a symphony orchestra conductor.

Naomi Munakata was a Japanese-born Brazilian choral conductor. She also had an academic career and taught in the city of São Paulo. She studied composition and conducting at the Instituto Musical de São Paulo and was trained under Eric Ericson in Sweden. She has been credited to have strengthened choral music in South America. 

Eugenia Manolidou is a Greek classical composer, television presenter, and conductor. Apart from her musical career, Manolidou has also appeared in popular TV shows like Dancing with the Stars and MasterChef Greece. In 2014, her work La Pisanella, the girl from Pisa was honored at Key to the Future, an opera composition competition, with the Popularity Prize.