Media Kit

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Michael Francis has developed an international reputation for sharing the power of music through his conducting and engaging speaking.

Appointed Music Director of the Florida Orchestra in the fall of 2014, he is now entering his eleventh season with a contract extension through the 2029-30 season. His role in building transformative Community-Engagement initiatives has helped to grow the organization significantly. As Music Director of the Mainly Mozart Festival in San Diego since 2014 (with a contract renewal through the summer of 2028), Francis and Mainly Mozart have recently completed an ambitious multi-year exploration of Mozart’s life. Entering his seventh season, Francis continues as Chief Conductor of Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz with a contract extension through 2029. Previously, he was Chief Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra from 2012-16.

Highlights include North American performances with the Cleveland Orchestra, the symphony orchestras of St. Louis, San Diego, Houston, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, Montreal, and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. In Europe, he has conducted the Symphony Orchestra of the Bavarian Radio, the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Dresden Philharmonic, MDR Leipzig, the Orquesta Sinfónica de RTVE Madrid and the Mariinsky Orchestra, amongst others. In his home country, he has worked with the London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, Philharmonia, BBC Philharmonic, BBC National Orchestra of Wales and the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland. In Asia, Maestro Francis has worked with the NHK Symphony, and the philharmonic orchestras of Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia and Seoul.

Michael Francis has collaborated with notable soloists such as Lang Lang, Arcadi Volodos, Itzhak Perlman, Christian Tetzlaff, Vadim Gluzman, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Javier Perianes, Jamie Barton, Truls Mørk, Håkan Hardenberger, Maximilian Hornung, Miloš, Benjamin Grosvenor, Emanuel Ax, Ian Bostridge, James Ehnes, Sting and many others.

Alongside his extensive educational work with young musicians, Francis is passionate about sharing the hidden truths in music with audiences worldwide through his acclaimed podium talks. His “Inside The Music” series and pre-concert talks in Florida have greatly helped develop new audiences. Additionally, an exciting new series of ‘Keynote’ presentations with Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz was released on Naxos.

Francis’ discography includes a recently released cycle of Mahler’s re-orchestrations of Beethoven’s symphonies and overtures with Staatsphilharmonie on Capriccio and the Symphonic Poems of Augusta Holmés on CPO. Francis also conducted the Rachmaninov piano concertos with Valentina Lisitsa and the LSO on Decca and Rihm’s Lichtes Spiel with Anne-Sophie Mutter and the New York Philharmonic for DG.

A former double-bass player in the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO), Michael Francis came to prominence as a conductor in January of 2007, stepping in for Valery Gergiev and John Adams with the LSO

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Labeled a “rising star” within the conducting world (Associated Press), conductor Chelsea Gallo has been praised for her ability to “lead the orchestra with grace and fiery command” (Michigan Daily). Her conducting style has been described as “fully in control … stylish, skillful and attentive” (Dallas News).

For the 2025-2026 season, Gallo begins her third season as Resident Conductor of The Florida Orchestra (conducting over 50 performances), Principal Guest Conductor of the Orlando Philharmonic, and returns to the New York Philharmonic to serve as an Assistant Conductor. She is the recipient of a 2022 Sir Georg Solti Career Assistance Grant and was a 2022 Hart Conducting Fellow with the Dallas Opera. Most recently, Gallo recorded the premiere album of the music from Johanna Senfter with the Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz in Germany under the Capriccio label.

Upcoming debuts include engagements with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Dayton Opera (Carmen), Noord Nederlands Orkest (The Netherlands), the Knoxville Symphony, Opera Tampa (Macbeth), Orquesta Filarmónica de Jalisco (Mexico), and the New Mexico Philharmonic. Gallo has conducted leading orchestras and opera companies including the Utah Symphony, Dallas Opera, Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the North Carolina Symphony, Sarasota Orchestra, Virginia Symphony, Opera Orlando, Toledo Symphony, Hartford Opera, Missouri Symphony, Marigny Opera, Slovak Sinfonietta, Bozeman Symphony, the Sewanee Music Festival, Jackson Symphony, the Lancaster Symphony, and the Youngstown Symphony among others.

A passionate advocate for expanding classical music’s reach, Gallo has collaborated with a wide range of organizations and companies, including The Walt Disney Company, New York Yankees, NASA, and the Lincoln Motor Company. She describes her artistic mission as “a devotion to sharing the relevancy and humanity within classical music.”

With a unique affinity for science and music, Gallo has spearheaded interdisciplinary projects uniting both worlds. She has partnered with NASA, Lockheed Martin, the National Institute of Aerospace and the European Space Agency, and led recording projects for NASA’s Orion EFT-1 launch mission. Her ensemble became the official artistic partner for the Hubble Space Telescope’s 25th Anniversary Celebrations. She was recently invited by the University of Michigan’s Department of Nuclear Engineering to collaborate on a project exploring creativity in the hard sciences by drawing parallels between conducting an orchestra and managing a nuclear reactor.

A champion of living composers, Gallo conducted the Michigan premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Helix, the American premiere of Michael Gordon’s Bassoon Concerto, and the world premiere of the ballet A Streetcar Named Desire by Tucker Fuller. During the 2025-26 season, she will give the U.S. premiere of Thierry Caens’ Tribones Triple Trombone Concerto. Her opera credits include productions of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, Die Zauberflöte, and Don Giovanni, Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Verdi’s La Traviata, Macbeth, and Falstaff, Bizet’s Carmen, Bernstein’s Candide and Shuying Li’s Who Married Star Husbands.

Gallo studied conducting in Vienna, Prague and Banská Štiavnica with Leoš Svárovský and the late Maksimilijan Cenčić. In Vienna, she also studied piano with Giorgi Latsabidze and violin with Barbara Gorzynska. She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Orchestral Conducting from the University of Michigan, where she studied under Kenneth Kiesler. Gallo has attended festivals and masterclasses with renowned conductors including Sir Simon Rattle and Daniel Barenboim.

The Florida Orchestra welcomed President & CEO Ignacio Barrón Viela in August 2023. Born in Zaragoza, Spain, Ignacio has brought global experience as a musician and engineer to lead the state’s largest professional orchestra in a new era of growth in Tampa Bay. He is a classically trained cellist who has spent more than a decade performing in orchestras and managing music projects worldwide.

Ignacio is passionate about expanding orchestras’ musical offerings and community engagement programs that focus on the issues and ideas of human relevancy across all economic and social groups: “Live music is an incredible, transformative platform to uplift society and shape a better world.”

He came to TFO from the Reno Philharmonic in Nevada, where as president and CEO he helped expand its artistic offerings with a wide variety of events and concerts, including a semi-staged opera. Post-pandemic audiences consistently grew, sometimes exceeding pre-pandemic levels. During his tenure, the Reno Phil Youth Symphony Orchestra performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. He also helped to develop a new, three-year vision and strategic plan that will enable the Reno Philharmonic to adopt progressive and practical initiatives for future development.

Before that, he was the executive director of the Billings Symphony in Montana for four years. He helped acquire the two largest single gifts in the organization’s 72-year history, a commercial building in downtown Billings that houses the Billings Symphony offices and brings additional revenue from retail tenants, and a seven-figure donation to sponsor the executive director’s position. He created key partnerships with local and national associations and helped double the symphony’s net worth and endowment.

While living and working in Dusseldorf, Germany, Ignacio was involved in managing orchestra tours in Europe with the Heinrich Heine Orchestra. Prior to his career in arts management, he worked seven years as a senior management consultant and project manager for two of the largest private investor-owned energy companies in the world. With projects in conventional power plants and renewable energy assets spanning across Europe, Asia, South America and the U.S., Ignacio specialized in operational excellence and performance management, skills that he brings to the orchestra field.

Ignacio holds a master’s degree in industrial engineering from the University of Zaragoza and an MBA from the University of Southern California (USC) Marshall School of Business, with an emphasis in arts leadership through the USC Thornton School of Music. In 2019, he was accepted to be one of only twelve orchestra professionals nationwide participating in the League of American Orchestras’ Emerging Leaders Program. In 2025, he was honored as one of the “40 Under 40” top leaders in Tampa Bay by the Tampa Bay Business Journal. In 2020, he was nominated as one of the “40 Under 40” most successful leaders in Montana, and in 2022 he was recognized with the Community Builder Award by the Downtown Billings Association.

In April 2025, Ignacio was honored to become an American citizen. He and his wife, Brianna, welcomed baby Julia to the family in January 2024. The family resides in St. Petersburg and enjoys exploring the beaches, discovering neighborhoods and learning from and engaging with people from all walks of life.