According to the New York Times, Paul Haas “is surely on the brink of a noteworthy career.” Haas is currently Music Director of the Bleecker Street Opera Theater in New York City, and his conducting engagements have included performances with the San Antonio Symphony, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, among others, as well as festival appearances. Recently, Paul conducted the National Symphony Orchestra with Itzhak Perlman as soloist, and the Washington Post had this to say:

“The young conductor Paul Haas was all about fresh thinking and visceral engagement. His musicmaking…revealed a keen musical mind and an impressive feeling for the natural pulse and trajectory of a score... Haas's sensitivity to rhythmic and dynamic gradation, and his ability to marry heartfelt expression with disciplined playing from the NSO...would have been impressive in a conductor three times his age. If Thursday’s concert was an accurate barometer of his talents, Haas is headed for a significant podium career.”

In addition to his orchestral engagements, Paul Haas is the founder and Artistic Director of Sympho, a groundbreaking concert production company. Sympho’s first concert, REWIND, is a revolutionary visual and sonic experience that has been lauded by critics. “REWIND Refits the Classical Experience for a New Century,” blared the New York Times headline. “Something momentous has occurred,” raved the San Francisco Chronicle. And Symphony Magazine declared, “Something important was happening, something with emotional stakes.” Haas unveiled Sympho’s second concert experience, TRACES, to rave reviews in March 2008, and Sympho’s new FLECTION concert premiered in May 2009 in New York City. For more information, please visit the website at www.SymphoConcerts.org.

Mr. Haas maintains an active role in the contemporary music scene, having commissioned dozens of new works, including one for every concert he conducted as Music Director of the New York Youth Symphony as part of its ASCAP Award-winning "First Music" program and over twenty commissions as Artistic Director of Sympho. His numerous television and radio appearances include features on a "CBS Sunday Morning" special entitled "American Maestro" and the McGraw-Hill Young Artists Showcase on New York's WQXR. Mr. Haas and the New York Youth Symphony were awarded the ASCAP-League of American Orchestras Bernstein Award for Educational Programming, the first time that coveted award has ever been presented to a youth orchestra. Haas was recently selected out of hundreds to perform in the League of American Orchestras’ prestigious National Conductor Preview.

Mr. Haas also enjoys a burgeoning composing career, having received the Selden Memorial Award and Friends of Music Composition Prize of Yale University. He recently conducted the premiere of his Matthew Says for orchestra, chorus, and two violin soloists at Carnegie Hall and premiered two orchestral pieces in New York City during the 2008-09 season. Other works include an a cappella Mass, as well as various orchestral and chamber works.

Paul Haas is a graduate of Yale University and the Juilliard School, where he studied conducting as a Bruno Walter Fellow with Otto-Werner Mueller.