About this Artist

CHRISTOPHER RUSSELL is Associate Professor and Chair of the Music Performance department at Azusa Pacific University (APU) in Southern California. He is conductor of the APU Symphony Orchestra and leads their graduate instrumental conducting program. The Los Angeles Times called him “a forcefully dramatic conductor with a strong technique”.  

Guest conducting appearances include the MasterWorks Festival in Ohio and Indiana, the Orquestra Sinfônica Heliópolis in São Paulo, Brazil, and orchestras in China including the Harbin Symphony, the Shenzhen City Philharmonic, and Zhengzhou’s Yellow River Symphony.  He has also conducted at Carnegie Hall, the Sydney Opera House, and famous concert halls in London, Vienna, Prague, Moscow, and Saint Petersburg.  He has lectured and judged festivals in other Chinese cities including Beijing, Dalian, Hong Kong, and Qingdao.

A new music advocate, Russell has conducted numerous premieres including the first U.S. performances of works by Tansy Davies, Brett Dean, Jonathan Harvey, Anders Hillborg, Tristan Keuris, Magnus Lindberg, Per Nørgård, Kaija Saariaho, and Éric Tanguy.  In 2008, he conducted the U.S. premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Stockholm Diary for string orchestra with the APU Symphony. 

Russell’s musical interest also extends to performing rarely-heard older music including the U.S. or California premieres of many works from the early and mid-20^th century including music by Havergal Brian, Rued Langgaard, Bohuslav Martinu, and Allan Pettersson. An advocate for conducting American music abroad, he conducted the Australian and Brazilian premieres of Ives’ 2^nd Symphony, the Austrian and Slovak premiere of Ives’ Decoration Day, and Russian premiere of Peter Mennin’s Symphony No. 5.  Russell conducted the world premiere of the Symphony in A composed in 1878 by Leopold Damrosch with the APU Symphony which they recorded for the British record label Toccata Classics.

For over 20 years until 2019, he conducted the Orange County School of the Arts Symphony Orchestra where he regularly received accolades for the orchestra’s quality and adventurous programming. The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers has awarded him their prestigious Award for Programming of Contemporary Music for youth orchestras on ten occasions.  Seven of those times, he was awarded first place in the United States.

He can be followed on Instagram @russellconductor