Fernando Raucci
Music Director & Conductor

Maestro Fernando Raucci has conducted professionally in the USA for the past five years. He brings a vitality born of talent, European training and culture to all his musical ensembles. Mr. Raucci is concurrently Music Director of the Greater Princeton Youth Orchestra. He was previously Music Director of Opera International, Princeton; Principal Guest Conductor, Greater Trenton Symphony Orchestra; Permanent Conductor, Nicola Amati Chamber Orchestra; Artistic Director, Armonie Notturne, Isernia, Italy; and Assistant to Mo. Maurizio Barbacini, Opera Company of Philadelphia for Don Carlo. He has conducted orchestras in Poland, Russia, Hungary, Italy, Romania, and Bulgaria. Until recently, he spent three successful years as Assistant of the American Symphony Orchestra, Lincoln Center, NYC, with Mo. Leon Botstein. In the summer of 2005, Raucci was an invited participant at the renowned Festival of Spoleto, Italy.

Maestro Raucci's educational background includes studies beginning in Italy with conservatory training emphasizing piano performance and contrapoint and fugue. He began to study conducting at age of 17, attending conservatories in Italy and throughout Europe. He has completed a Master's degree in Orchestra Conducting at the Hartt School of Music in Hartford, receiving the Recognition of Excellence Award in Orchestral Conducting. Mo. Harold Farbermann comments, "Raucci instinctively understands line, color and pacing, and his performances are always interesting and satisfying. He has a bright future."

In addition to Raucci's musical activities in his adopted USA homeland, he has been committed to educating others about Italy and its music cultural heritage. He has brought traditional Italian favorites to the American stage, and introduced audiences to unique Italian traditions. In 2003, he was awarded the prestigious Accademico, an annual international prize from the European Academy for Economical Cultural Relations (AEREC) for advancing the cause of cultural exchange between nations. In 2004, he was inducted into the Italian-American National Hall of Fame in Atlantic City, NJ. New Jersey Governor James McGreevey commended Raucci, in 2002, for making the Greater Princeton Youth Orchestra one of the best cultural organizations in New Jersey.

Mr. Raucci's exceptional conducting accomplishments have earned him high praise from many other sources, as well. In the words of Mo. Zubin Metha, "Fernando Raucci is a promising young conductor, intelligent, serious with innate musicality. He is on his way to a successful career." And in the words of Maestro Piero Bellugi, "Raucci shows a remarkable musicality and an inborn conducting talent." Maestro Raucci’s debut with the Greater Trenton Symphony Orchestra received high acclaim.  "At the opening measures, there were audible murmurs of approval from the audience. Raucci’s crisp, clear directions brought alert response from the musicians." (The Times), and Maestro Raucci’s success with Greater Princeton Youth Orchestra is summed up in their debut concert review headline, "GPYO Dazzles Under Director Raucci" (Don Delaney, The Times). The reviewer terms the concert "a display of music-making that can be described without exaggeration as startling, almost unbelievable. Such is the excellence and vitality enjoyed by the fortunate ensembles under Maestro Raucci’s direction."  And in his article The Popov Discontinuity, music critic Alex Ross of The New Yorker recalls the Chamber Symphony of Gavriil Popov "heard at Bard in a fine performance under the direction of Fernando Raucci."