Biography

Nathaniel Efthimiou is the newly appointed Assistant Conductor of the Jacksonville Symphony and Music Director of Jacksonville Symphony Youth Orchestras. He previously served as Assistant Conductor of the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra and Assistant Professor of Music at Berklee College of Music. He is a four-time recipient of The Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award and was recently selected by members of the Vienna Philharmonic as the AAF/Faber Young Conductor Fellowship (formerly the Karajan Fellowship) at the Salzburg Festival. He was a semi-finalist in the 2nd Hong Kong International Conducting Competition 2023.

 

During his tenure at the Rhode Island Philharmonic, he received critical acclaim for two last-minute appearances on subscription programs. He has also led education programs serving young people across Rhode Island and southern Massachusetts. Nathaniel has conducted orchestras such as the London Symphony Orchestra, as a quarter-finalist in the Donatella Flick Conducting Competition 2021, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, Amarillo Symphony, Southwest Florida Symphony Orchestra, and musicians of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra. He has covered conductors such as Leonard Slatkin, Keith Lockhart, Robert Spano, and Thomas Wilkins with orchestras including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, and Portland Symphony Orchestra.

 

As a passionate educator, he has worked with the New England Conservatory’s Summer Orchestra Institute, Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras, and served on a selection committee for the Anthony Quinn Foundation’s student scholarships. He has been a guest conductor and lecturer with numerous colleges, including Boston University, where he presented a seminar on “The Evolution from Student to Professional” with Boston University’s doctoral conducting candidates. He also served as the Head of Instrumental Activities at Westminster Academy in Memphis, Tennessee.

 

Nathaniel is equally comfortable in the opera pit and was the recipient of the 2023 Elizabeth Buccheri Opera Residency program with Opera Southwest (Albuquerque, NM), where he assisted Anthony Barrese and conducted Rossini’s L’occasione fa il ladro. He has also worked on productions ranging from Debussy’s Pélleas et Mélisande, Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, and Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore. In October 2018, he led four performances of Tom Cipullo’s provocative operetta, After Life, at BU Opera Institute’s “Fringe Festival.”

 

As a former composer, Nathaniel is a dedicated advocate for new music. He has brought new works to life with the Susan and Ford Schumann Center for Composition Studies at the Aspen Music Festival, the BU Opera Institute, and the Boston University Center for New Music. He studied composition with Joel Hoffman, David Ludwig, and David Davies, and his work has been featured in festivals such as the Atlantic Music Festival (Maine), “UPBEAT” (Croatia), and WSKG’s television program, Expressions (Binghamton, NY).

 

Nathaniel began studying piano, violin, and organ from an early age and later began studying composition. His path to conducting grew from his interdisciplinary approach to music and the Arts, which he still maintains today. He has served as associate concertmaster of the Southern Tier Symphony Orchestra (Olean, NY) and actively freelanced as a violinist in Memphis, TN. He has studied conducting at numerous festivals including the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he was awarded the James Conlon Conductor Prize (2016), the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, and Domaine Forget de Charlevoix. His teachers have included Bramwell Tovey, Robert Spano, Larry Rachleff, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and Cristian Măcelaru. He received both his Bachelor of Music and Master of Arts from the Greatbatch School of Music and his Doctor of Musical Arts from Boston University.