Luca Antonucci

A versatile conductor with a passion for creating community through music, Luca Antonucci is equally at home in front of an orchestra, leading choirs, or in the opera pit. His work has included stops in the US, Europe, and Latin America, including in Boston Symphony Hall, Carnegie Hall, Tanglewood, the Wiener Konzerthaus, Argentina’s Centro Cultural Kirchner, Cape Town City Hall, Soweto’s historic Regina Mundi Church, and many others. 

He currently serves as the Director of Orchestral Studies at Oklahoma State University, Music Director of Boston Summer Opera, Artistic Director of the Open Door Ensembles of Boston, cover conductor for the Portland Symphony, and as a member of the music staff of the Berkshire Opera Festival, where he is Assistant Conductor and Chorusmaster, and has been invited to serve as a cover conductor with the Detroit Symphony and National Symphony Orchestra. 

Recent appearances include as guest conductor with the Spectrum Orchestra in Bloomfield Hills, MI and as Assistant Conductor with The Washington Chorus on its concert tour to Buenos Aires, where he prepared the Orquesta Juvenil Libertador de San Martín, Argentina’s premiere training orchestra, for its performances of Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” with baritone Will Liverman under the direction of Eugene Rogers.

A champion of music by composers from historically underrepresented backgrounds, Antonucci is the founder and Artistic Director of the Orchestra Without Borders of Boston, which presents works by composers from around the globe in collaboration with performers from a diverse range of traditions outside of classical music. He has also served as a producer on world-premiere recordings of the Michigan Orchestral Repertory Equity Initiative and as a production assistant on Naxos's critically-acclaimed recording of James P. Johnson's operas "De Organizer" and "The Dreamy Kid," and is the founder of the Boston Summer Singers, whose mission is to support local organizations working to change systemic social issues from hunger to immigrant rights through inclusive musical performances. 

An experienced educator and a passionate advocate of amateur music-making, Antonucci has brought dynamic leadership to a number of collegiate and community ensembles throughout the US, including the University of Michigan Campus Orchestras, the Michigan Life Sciences and Pops Orchestras, the Manchester Symphony Orchestra and Chorale, the Lincoln-Sudbury Civic Orchestra, and the Pioneer Valley Symphony Orchestra and Youth Orchestra. He also worked as a middle and high school band director in the Boston area, where he taught subjects ranging from beginning improvisation and jazz band to the History of Hip-Hop, in addition to developing a middle-school music curriculum based on the intersection between blues music, American protest music of the 20th century, and samba-reggae. 

Dr. Antonucci is the co-founder of Boston Summer Opera, whose mission is to create opportunities for young professionals and advanced graduate students to explore the operatic repertoire alongside established singers, and his work as Chorusmaster of the Berkshire Opera Festival has been praised as “stellar” (the Berkshire Eagle) "thrilling" (OperaWire) and “vibrant” (In the Spotlight). Other recent production credits include as assistant conductor at Opera in the Heights for La Bohéme, and as assistant conductor and coach for three productions of the University of Michigan, including a 2023 "Orphée aux Enfers" that recieved national press. 

Previously, Dr. Antonucci enjoyed an active freelance career in Boston as a trumpeter, keyboardist, choral director, and singer, performing with the Boston Firemen’s Band, Bay Colony Brass, New England Film Orchestra, the Oberlandler Hofbrau Band, Charles River Brass Quintet, and Zamir Chorale, where he served as conducting intern, and holding a series of church music positions before an injury led him to pursue orchestral conducting full-time. 

The recipient of a U.S. Department of State Fulbright grant to study the life of Arnold Schoenberg in Vienna, where he published with the Journal of the Arnold Schönberg Center and studied at the University for Music and Performing Arts, Luca is the winner of numerous academic awards and a graduate of the Hartt School, the University of Michigan, and Amherst College. Most recently, he is published as a contributor to "Observing in Music Classrooms," edited by Colleen Conway.  

Additional studies include at the European American Musical Alliance, Domaine Forget, the Donau Brass Festival, the International Conductors Institute, the Conductors Institute of South Carolina, the International Conducting Workshop and Festival, the Conductors Retreat at Medomak, and the Miami Beach International Classical Music Festival, where he was awarded first prize in the annual conducting competition. He has participated in masterclasses with Benjamin Zander, Donald Schleicher, Mark Gibson, and Edward Gardner, among others.