Lois Ferrari
Professor of Music
Expertise
Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, Conducting
Italian-American conductor, Lois Ferrari, is Professor of Music at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas and has been a member of the faculty since 1993. Dr. Ferrari conducts the SU Orchestra and Wind Ensemble, and teaches conducting. She also serves as host and clinician for the SU Conductors’ Institute in Instrumental conducting.
As Music Director of the Austin Civic Orchestra, Maestra Ferrari was awarded 2nd place (2016 and 2010) and Finalist (2014) for the American Prize in community orchestra conducting. In 2010, she was honored as the first woman to conduct an orchestral performance at the Long Center for the Performing Arts in Austin. Over the years, Dr. Ferrari has brought many celebrated guest artists to the ACO stage, including David Amram, Peter Bay, Lauren Lane, Jessica Mathaes, Anton Nel, Michelle Schumann, and David Whitwell.
She has also been intimately involved with nurturing future virtuosi through the ACO’s Pearl Amster Youth Concerto Festival and Chamber Music Program, and with the Texas Rising Stars Concert, presented in collaboration with the Butler School of Music at the University of Texas.
An enthusiastic champion of new music, Maestra Ferrari founded the ACO Composition Contest and is proud to have premiered nearly thirty works during the course of her career. One such work was nominated by the Austin Critics’ Table for Best Symphonic Performance of 2009. In 2012, Dr. Ferrari and the ACO were commissioned by composer David Amram to present the Texas premiere of his Symphonic Variations on a Song by Woody Guthrie.
A graduate of the Eastman School of Music, where she received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in conducting, Dr. Ferrari received a full doctoral fellowship and was appointed Associate Conductor of the renowned Eastman Wind Ensemble. She also earned a Master of Music degree in conducting and a Bachelor of Music degree with a double major in performance and music education from the Ithaca College School of Music. Her principal teachers were Donald Hunsberger, Rodney Winther, David Effron, Pamela Gearhart, Larry Doebler, and Donald Neuen.
Originally from Long Island, NY, Maestra Ferrari now resides in Georgetown, TX with her husband, Dr. Paul Gaffney, and their cat, Gandhi.
Education
Doctor of Musical Arts, Eastman School of Music 1993
Master of Music, Ithaca College School of Music 1989
Bachelor of Music, Ithaca College School of Music 1984
pre-med (transferred), SUNY Albany 1980