Colburn Orchestra

Now in its 23rd season, the Colburn Orchestra is the flagship ensemble of the Colburn Conservatory of Music. Under the direction of Music Director Yehuda Gilad, the Colburn Orchestra performs across Southern California in venues including Walt Disney Concert Hall, Ambassador Auditorium, the Soraya, Royce Hall, Soka Performing Arts Center, the Wallis, the Broad Stage, and Segerstrom Concert Hall, as well as on the Colburn campus in Zipper Hall. Dedicated to serving the greater Los Angeles community, the Colburn Orchestra performs for schools in neighboring communities every year, giving five concerts in a one-week period to school children of all ages.

In 2026, the orchestra made its Ojai Festival debut with two performances under the baton of festival music director and Colburn faculty Esa-Pekka Salonen. The Colburn Orchestra also made its United Kingdom debut at the Edinburgh International Festival in 2018.

Since the inception of the Orchestra, Gilad and the esteemed Colburn faculty have invited leading guest artists to perform with the Colburn Orchestra to mirror a professional orchestral experience. Esa-Pekka Salonen, head of the School’s Negaunee Conducting Program and the Maestro Ernst H. Katz Chair of Conducting Studies, regularly leads the orchestra and previous visiting conductors include James Conlon, Stéphane Denève, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, Earl Lee, Nicholas McGegan, Peter Oundjian, and Carlos Miguel Prieto. Acclaimed artists such as Mstislav Rostropovich and Itzhak Perlman actively worked with the orchestra during its inaugural year.

Colburn Orchestra recordings include a live recording of Mahler's Symphony No. 5 led by guest conductor Gerard Schwarz (Yarlung Records); an album of works by Menachem Wiesenberg (Live Classics) featuring Ronald Leonard performing Wiesenberg’s Cello Concerto; and If You Love For Beauty (Yarlung), featuring worksby John Adams, Chausson, Handel, and Mahler with mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke.

The Colburn Orchestra is generously underwritten by Eva and Marc Stern.