Samantha Burgess

We are excited to announce that Samantha Burgess has been appointed as Assistant Conductor for our 77th Season. Burgess will conduct in multiple subscription concerts throughout the season and lead the Symphony’s Annual Family Concert in April 2026.

“We are thrilled to welcome Samantha Burgess to the Peninsula Symphony family,” said Music Director and Conductor Mitchell Sardou Klein, who just celebrated his 40th season with the orchestra. “Samantha brings a background of superb training and successful experience on the podiums of a variety of professional and community ensembles, which complements her engaging and lively podium presence.”

Since moving to the Bay Area in 2022, Burgess has quickly become an in-demand conductor. In the 2024–25 season, she was appointed Music Director of the Community Women’s Orchestra and served as Assistant Conductor for the Berkeley Symphony—a role she will continue alongside her new position with the Peninsula Symphony.

Burgess’s recent engagements include guest conducting with the Napa Valley Chorale, assisting on Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Oakland Symphony, and touring Paris and the Loire Valley with the Berkeley Community Chorus and Orchestra. Her previous positions include Assistant Conductor with the Berkeley Community Chorus and Orchestra, Westerville Symphony (Ohio), Galesburg Community Chorus (Illinois), and Oxford University Philharmonia (UK).

She holds master’s degrees in Orchestral Conducting and Music Theory from The Ohio State University, where she served as Music Director of the Ohio State Community Orchestra and Assistant Conductor for the Ohio State Symphony Orchestra. While at OSU, Burgess was also a graduate teaching assistant in Music Theory and a member of the Cognitive and Systematic Musicology Laboratory. Her conducting work often integrates her research in music cognition into innovative, multimedia performances.

Burgess has presented at conferences including the Society for Music Theory Midwest Conference, Future Directions of Music Cognition, and the Oxford Conducting Institute International Conducting Studies Conference. Internationally, she was a semi-finalist in the 2023 International Academy and Competition for Orchestral Conducting in Portugal and has participated in prestigious workshops such as the George Hurst Conductor’s Course, the London Conducting Workshop, the New York Conducting Workshop, and the International Conducting Workshop and Competition in Atlanta, Ga.

Welcome, Samantha!