Vinay Parameswaran

Internationally recognised for his energetic presence, imaginative programming, and compelling musicianship, Vinay Parameswaran is one of the most exciting and versatile young conductors on the podium today.

Recent highlights include Parameswaran’s debuts with the Phoenix Symphony, San Antonio Philharmonic, Knoxville Symphony, Charlotte Symphony and Houston Symphony, return appearances with the Nashville Symphony and Rochester Philharmonic orchestras, opera productions for Curtis Opera Theater and Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and education and family concerts with the Chicago Symphony and New Jersey Symphony. The 2024/25 season sees Parameswaran make his debut with the London Philharmonic, Philharmonia (London), BBC Symphony, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Chicago Sinfonietta and Seattle Symphony.

In the 2021/22 season, Parameswaran concluded five seasons with the Cleveland Orchestra, where he was Assistant Conductor from 2017/18 and promoted to Associate Conductor in 2021. During this period, he conducted many concerts each season at Severance Hall, Blossom Music Festival, and on tour. As Music Director, he led the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra on an acclaimed four-city European tour that included a performance at the Musikverein in Vienna.

Prior to his position with the Cleveland Orchestra, Parameswaran was the Associate Conductor of the Nashville Symphony for three seasons and led over 150 performances, which included his subscription debut with the Orchestra in 2016/17, conducting works by Gabriella Smith, Grieg, and Prokofiev. Other highlights have included debuts with the Pittsburgh Symphony, Detroit Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra, Louisville Orchestra, North Carolina Symphony, Grant Park Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony, and Jacksonville Symphony.

Equally at home in symphonic and operatic repertoire, and in the recording studio, Parameswaran has led performances of Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love and Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen with Curtis Opera Theater. In Cleveland, he has assisted Franz Welser-Möst on productions of Verdi’s Otello, Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde and Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos. In 2020/21 Parameswaran recorded the album Two x Four With the Curtis Ensemble 20/21 and violinists Jaime Laredo and Jennifer Koh, featuring works by Bach, David Ludwig, Philip Glass, and Anna Clyne as well as recording a selection of concerts with the Cleveland Orchestra for the Orchestra’s digital streaming platform.

Parameswaran was a Conducting Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, and has participated in conducting masterclasses with David Zinman at the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, as well as with Marin Alsop and Gustav Meier at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music. Parameswaran was a recipient of a Career Assistance Award by the Solti Foundation U.S. in May 2021.

A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, Parameswaran graduated with honours from Brown University with a Bachelor of Arts in music and political science.  At Brown, he began his conducting studies with Paul Phillips.  He received an Artist Diploma in conducting from the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with renowned pedagogue Otto-Werner Mueller as the Albert M. Greenfield Fellow.

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