The Curtis Institute of Music has announced the expansion of its conducting program, while also making Yannick Nézet-Séguin the school’s Head of Conducting

In his new role, the Met Opera’s Music Director will oversee the newly expanded program and work individually with conducting fellows on operatic and symphonic repertoire. The fellows will also work with the school’s voice and opera department as part of the training.

“The expansion of Curtis’s conducting program is exciting for the future of leadership in our field,” Nézet-Séguin said in an official press statement issued by the company. “The idea that Curtis will help create conductors who are equally at home in the worlds of both operatic and orchestral conducting—as I am—is unique in this country. These two worlds, so different in format, are woven together by the common acts of singing, shaping, and reacting.”

There will also be an increase in the number of conducting fellows from two to three and the program will now last three years, instead of two. The changes will be implemented at the start of the 2024-25 academic year.