Per Brevig, Music Director and Conductor of the East Texas Symphony Orchestra

Maestro Per Brevig brings extensive experience as both performer and conductor to his position with the East Texas Symphony Orchestra. Norwegian born, Mr. Brevig received his music training at The Juilliard School and holds a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree. He was principal trombonist of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra from 1968 to 1994 and has performed as soloist with major orchestras throughout the world. Numerous commissions and premiers are to his credit. He has an extensive solo discography and is a frequent adjudicator of major competitions.

On leaving his position with the Metropolitan Opera, Maestro Brevig's conducting career expanded quickly. In the five years following 1994 he conducted more than twenty operas. A review in The New York Times declared Maestro Brevig "shaped the performance [of Rigoletto] artfully."

He is continuing his teaching affiliations with the Aspen Music Festival, Colorado, as well as the music schools of Juilliard, Manhattan and Mannes in New York. His conducting repertoire runs the gamut from Renaissance to contemporary music. A staunch advocate of contemporary music he has commissioned and performed numerous new works.

Maestro Brevig has received numerous awards, including a Koussevitsky Fellowship, Henry B. Cabot Award, three Naumburg Fellowships, the Neill Humfeld Award for excellence in teaching and a prize in the XIV International Music Competition in Prague. In 1990, King Olav V of Norway awarded him the Royal Medal of St. Olav in recognition of his efforts on behalf of Norwegian music and culture in the United States.

Mr. Brevig has studied the medical problems faced by musicians and serves on the Advisory Boards of Medical Problems of Performing Artists and Musikphysiologie und Musik Medizin, a publication from Stuttgart, Germany.

A champion of Scandinavian music, Mr. Brevig is founder and president of the Edvard Grieg Society, Inc., New York. Since 1991 the Society has, under his leadership, produced more than 50 events: recitals, chamber performances, radio broadcasts and symposia at Columbia University, to celebrate the composer's sesquicentennial. Events often culminate with a performance at Lincoln Center with Maestro Brevig leading the Orchestra of St. Luke's. New York Times wrote: "Brevig was utterly convincing and rewarding." New York Concert Review asserted: "Brevig's conducting is clear and elegant, authoritative without being authoritarian." Maestro Brevig resides in New Jersey with his wife Berit.

On November 6, 2005, the Edvard Grieg Society, Inc. New York, in collaboration with the Royal Norweigian Consulate General and Third District Sons of Norway, celebrated the 100th anniversary of Norwegian Independence, at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center in concert with Orchestra of Saint Luke's, conducted by Maestro Brevig.