Dean Whiteside, conductor

Dean Whiteside was born in New York City and trained in Vienna at the University of Music and Performing Arts. He is a former New World Symphony Conducting Fellow. Mr. Whiteside is founder and director of the Nashville Sinfonietta, hailed by The Tennessean as “a virtuoso band.” He opened the Blair School of Music’s 2013-14 season directing a multimedia realization of Haydn’s Seven Last Words of Our Savior on the Cross called “innovative” by The Tennessean and “deeply meditative and satisfyingly original” by ArtsNash. 

Mr. Whiteside’s European debut came in 2011 after winning the Jorma Panula Blue Danube Masterclass and Competition. He has conducted orchestras such as the Boston Symphony, Danish National Symphony, Jacksonville Symphony, Juilliard Orchestra, Opéra Orchestre National Montpellier, Orlando Philharmonic, Polish Baltic Philharmonic, Sibiu Philharmonic, Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Tokyo Philharmonic, Wiener Kammerorchester and Zagreb Philharmonic, as well as the Vanderbilt Orchestra on a five-city tour of China. He has served as Cover Conductor to the Dallas Symphony and San Francisco Symphony.

Mr. Whiteside is the winner of the American Prize in Conducting and received second prize and the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra Award at the Sixth International Competition of Young Conductors Lovro von Matačić. Other awards include the 2017 Mahler Conducting Fellowship, Bruno Walter Memorial Foundation Conducting Scholarship, Croatian Composers' Society Award, David Effron Conducting Fellowship, Bayreuth Festival Scholarship and David Rabin Performance Prize. He has received fellowships from the Aspen Music Festival, Atlantic Music Festival, Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music and Castleton Festival.

Mr. Whiteside has worked closely with such conductors as Bertrand de Billy, Fabio Luisi, Lorin Maazel, Jun Märkl, Kurt Masur, Jorma Panula, Leonard Slatkin and Robert Spano. He began his conducting studies with Robin Fountain at Vanderbilt University.

Mark Grisez, host

Mark Grisez, originally from Fresno, California, is a third-year Trumpet Fellow at the New World Symphony. He has most recently performed as Acting Associate Principal Trumpet of the San Francisco Symphony from 2014 to 2016, playing at Carnegie Hall, Royal Albert Hall, the Berliner Philharmonie, the Royal Concertgebouw, and other halls across Europe and the United States. He has also held the position of Principal Trumpet of the California Symphony in Walnut Creek and played during the summers as a fellow of the National Repertory Orchestra and the Tanglewood Music Center. In May of 2015 he was named Musical America’s New Artist of the Month. 

Mr. Grisez received his bachelor's degree in music performance in 2015 from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he studied under David Burkhart and Mark Inouye. While in school, he was a member of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, was avidly involved in multiple chamber ensembles and, alongside his brass quintet, represented the Conservatory at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. for the Millennium Stage Conservatory Project. 

While living in San Francisco, Mr. Grisez also performed with the San Francisco Opera, The Bay Brass, One Found Sound and Nomad Session, an eight-member traveling pop-up ensemble of which he is a founding member. He has taught as a brass coach for the Stanford Youth Orchestra and San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and has led masterclasses at Sacramento State University and the San Francisco Conservatory. In his spare time, he enjoys writing, curating a collection of fine pencils, reading too many books and running.

Joseph Peterson, host

Joseph Peterson is a third-year Trombone Fellow at the New World Symphony. Before moving to Miami Beach, he served as acting second trombone of the Charlotte Symphony for the 2015-16 winter season.

Mr. Peterson received his master’s degree from Northwestern University where he studied with Michael Mulcahy, Peter Ellefson, Randy Hawes, Doug Wright, Timothy Higgins and NWS alumnus Christopher Davis. During his time in Chicago, Mr. Peterson was also a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago and performed with the Chicago Symphony on several occasions. He received his bachelor’s degree from The Juilliard School, where he studied with Joseph Alessi.

Mr. Peterson has been a member of the Aspen Music Festival, Colorado Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, National Orchestral Institute, National Repertory Orchestra and the Tanglewood Music Center. In addition to the Charlotte and Chicago symphonies, he has also performed with the Colorado Symphony and the Louisville Orchestra.

A native of Bothell, Washington, Mr. Peterson’s teachers include Koichiro Yamamoto, Chris Olka, Hamod EbuEid and Peter Ellefson. He has performed with the Seattle Opera, along with being a soloist with the Seattle Symphony performing Ferdinand David’s Concertino. Some of the prizes that he has won include being the winner of the International Trombone Association’s Lewis Van Haney Competition, second prize at the Minnesota Orchestra’s Steven Zellmer Competition and the bronze medal at the wind division of the Fischoff Competition with the Lincoln Chamber Brass.

Mr. Peterson has also been involved in several teaching engagements including being an Ear Training Teaching Fellow at The Juilliard School, presenting a masterclass at Illinois State University, and has been a guest instructor at the NEOJIBA Youth Orchestra in Salvador, Brazil. Some of the distinguished conductors that he has played under include Charles Dutoit, Alan Gilbert, Bernard Haitink, Riccardo Muti and Christoph von Dohnányi.

Kip Riecken, host

Second-year Viola Fellow Kip Riecken guides listeners toward curiosity and discovery of personal meaning as they engage with works of music. He has performed with the Chicago Symphony and collaborated with Yo-Yo Ma, Robert Hanford and other eminent musicians.

As fellow and co-principal violist the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Mr. Riecken worked to bring music out of the performance hall to connect with new audiences. He co-created interactive programs, recorded an album of music written and performed by youth prison inmates, and designed and implemented The Rediscovering Musician, a project providing a series of Alexander Technique lessons for two Civic musicians and exploring how the Technique’s principles guide individuals along unique paths of discovery.

Drawing on his experiences in Chicago, Mr. Riecken created Farm to Stage, an initiative connecting Miami-based New World Symphony Fellows with migrant farmworkers of South Florida. He looks forward to leading a group of current Fellows in a project increasing Spanish fluency within the orchestra.

Mr. Riecken grew up in Orlando and attended New York University and Florida State University, where he studied pre-health and German. He enjoys cooking, reading on various subjects and spending time outside.