Samuel Hollister

Conductor, pianist, harpsichordist, composer, and theorist Samuel Hollister believes that music tells powerful stories that can create and strengthen community. Since 2024, he has served as the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra’s Assistant Conductor and The Fred M. Saigh Youth Orchestra Music Director. Hollister is a doctoral post-resident in orchestral conducting at the Yale School of Music, having finished his residency in 2024. He served as the Music Director of the Civic Orchestra of New Haven in 2023-2024 and served on the faculty of the University of Rhode Island in 2022-2023 as the director of orchestral activities. Hollister has assisted conductors including Leonard Slatkin, Marin Alsop, Peter Oundjian, and John Storgårds at orchestras including St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Colorado Music Festival, and Waterbury Symphony Orchestra. He earned his master’s degrees in orchestral conducting and music theory pedagogy from Peabody and his bachelor’s degree in music and mathematics from Yale. He is thrilled to serve as the David Effron conducting fellow at the Chautauqua Institution during the summer of 2024. 

Hollister is a fierce advocate of new music and has worked closely with composers including John Corigliano, Joan Tower, and Adolphus Hailstork. Through his music director positions, he has commissioned a plethora of new works, including concertos for guitar and marimba. Hollister’s passion for new music includes unearthing long-lost masterworks of the past. In 2022, he co-founded and led the “Emilie Mayer Project” at University of Rhode Island, for which he helped create the first public domain edition of her Overture No. 3 for any orchestra to use and perform from for free. Hollister has led the work in its first two live performances since its premiere in the 1850s, and he continues to champion the unsung gems of Mayer and others. In 2018, Hollister founded Aurora Collaborative, a Rhode Island non-profit community music organization blending music with art and writing, where he continued advocating for new music and innovative concert experiences. As a composer himself, he has written and arranged extensively for piano, chamber ensembles, orchestra, and choir. 

A dedicated pianist, harpsichordist, vocal coach, and conductor, Hollister enjoys bringing his unique aural skills and passion for communication to the world of opera. He was named a conducting fellow and pianist at Opera Saratoga in 2022, and he worked with Peabody’s Opera Department from 2020-2022. He conducted and played piano and harpsichord at the Eastern Music Festival in 2019 and 2021, where he also read full orchestral scores at the piano for the conducting seminars. 

Hollister has conducted, played, and studied around the world, including in South Africa, Spain, Mexico, Hungary, Austria, Ukraine, Bulgaria, and Canada, and has appeared in masterclasses with teachers including Yo-Yo Ma, Jeffrey Kahane, Awadagin Pratt, Dalia Stasevska, Larry Rachleff, Rune Bergmann, Jonathon Heyward, and Benjamin Zander. When he’s not making music, you’ll likely find him playing a game of chess or exploring nature with his camera in hand.