Steven Amundson

Steven Amundson began his teaching and conducting career in Tacoma, Washington where he was music director of the Tacoma Youth Symphony. He joined the music faculty of St. Olaf College in 1981 and currently serves as Professor of Music and Conductor of the St. Olaf Orchestra. The orchestra is recognized as one of the finest collegiate symphonies in this country and recently won the American Prize in Orchestra Performance . Under Amundson's direction, the St. Olaf Orchestra has toured widely throughout the United States and Europe, and has been featured on Austrian National Radio, National Public Radio (including two appearances on Garrison Keillor's A Prairie Home Companion), National Public Television, and at regional and national music conventions.
Amundson is the founding conductor of the Twin Cities' based Metropolitan Symphony which he led for five years. He also served as Music Director and Conductor of the Bloomington (MN) Symphony from 1984 to 1997. He has held posts on the conducting faculty for the Interlochen National Arts Camp, the Lutheran Summer Music Program and has served as guest conductor for many All-State and Honors Orchestra festivals throughout the United States. Amundson remains active as guest conductor of professional ensembles in Minnesota and has led the Minneapolis Pops Orchestra, Duluth-Superior Symphony Orchestra, the Fargo-Moorhead Symphony and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. An active composer and arranger, Amundson's self-published compositions are represented by Tempo Music Resource. He is also published by Boosey and Hawkes and the Neil A. Kjos Music Co. His orchestral works have received over 1,000 performances by university, civic and professional orchestras including the Alabama, Atlanta, Chicago, Cincinnati, Colorado Springs, Columbus, Dallas, Dayton, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Hilton Head, Kansas City, Houston, Illinois, Jacksonville, Long Beach, Madison, Maryland, Milwaukee, New Mexico, Orlando, Omaha, Oregon, Peninsula Pops, Phoenix, Portland (Maine), Rhode Island, San Antonio, San Diego, St. Louis, South Dakota, Tacoma, Utah, and Virginia Symphonies. His works have also been performed internationally in Canada, England, and Taiwan. A 1977 graduate of Luther College, Amundson obtained the Master of Music degree in orchestral conducting from Northwestern University and did further studies at the University of Virginia, the Aspen Music School and the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. He has enjoyed the tutelage of notable conductors including Maurice Abravanel, Milan Horvat, Erich Leinsdorf, and Bernard Rubenstein.

Matthew Peterson was born and raised in North Dakota. After studies at St Olaf College and Indiana University School of Music, where he was a student of Sven-David Sandström, he moved to Sweden on a Fulbright Grant and has since become one of the country's most celebrated composers.  

Peterson’s music contains multitudes: seriousness, humor, power, tenderness, willfulness - the grand and sublime as well as the fragile and delicate. His music has been commissioned and performed around the world by leading ensembles including the Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Washington National Opera at the Kennedy Center, Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, the Swedish Radio Choir, the St. Olaf Choir, and Eric Ericsons Chamber Choir. 

He is the 2024-26 composer-in-residence with Dalasinfoniettan and current commissions include a percussion concerto, a work for the Swedish Radio Choir’s 100 year jubilee, an opera, and symphony for the Radio Choir and Dalasinfoniettan.

Peterson has recently been recognized with the 2024 Christ Johnson prize and the 2023 Carin Malmlöf-Forssling Composer Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Music, the 2023 Musikförläggarnas Pris (Swedish Music Publishers’ Award) for An Inner Sky, the 2022 Sven-David Sandström Award for Choral Composition, and “Classical of the Year” 2021 from Dalecarlia Music Awards. 

His recordings are released on European Gramophone, RedHouse, Naxos and Footprint, and his music is available on all streaming platforms including Spotify and Apple Music, as well as Youtube and Soundcloud. He is published by Gehrmans Musikförlag, with select works available from Tempo Music Resource, Svensk Musik, and Edition Skellton. He lives in Dalarna with his partner and their two children, and he is an avid outdoorsman. https://www.matthew-peterson.com