MARIA SENSI SELLNER is an emerging young conductor with experience in opera, orchestra, and choral venues. Ms Sellner has recently conducted performances of Poulenc’s Dialogues of the Carmelites for the Carnegie Mellon University School of Music, and will serve as assistant conductor for upcoming productions of Carmen and Otello with Opera Carolina.  She has previously assisted on productions at Indianapolis Opera and Opera Theater of Pittsburgh.   Ms. Sellner had the rare and valuable opportunity to conduct three operas while  a graduate student in conducting under the mentorship of Robert Page: Weill’s Street Scene, Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea, and Menotti’s The Consul. 

Ms. Sellner is currently in her eighth season as music director of the All University Orchestra and String Theory Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Mellon University. She also serves as a conducting assistant for the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh, chorus of choice of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.  Additionally, Ms. Sellner has self-produced and conducted independent concerts in Pittsburgh and the surrounding communities, including benefit performances of Bach’s St. John Passion with the Musicamici Chamber Orchestra and Chorus, (ensembles that she founded), and a performance of Stravinsky’s L’Histoire du Soldat, with innovative staging by director Marya Spring Cordes and narrated by Robert Page.

Ms. Sellner has been invited to conduct in workshops and masterclasses in California, New York City, London, New Hampshire, and South Carolina.  In 2008 and 2009, she conducted on the Discovery Series Concerts at the Oregon Bach Festival, as a part of the Conducting Masterclass with renowned Bach conductor Helmuth Rilling.  In these workshops, Maria has worked with a number of maestros including Daniel Lewis, Kenneth Kiesler, Neil Thompson, Donald Thulean, Nicholas McGegan, John Farrer, Samuel Jones, and Paul Vermel.  She was awarded the 2008 Sigma Alpha Iota International Music Fraternity Conducting Scholarship, and has completed a masters degree in conducting, studying with Maestro Robert Page. 

Ms. Sellner comes to the podium with a diverse background.  Her early musical studies included the piano and flute, but she later focused on composition and voice.  She has earned MM and BFA degrees in composition (studying with Nancy Galbraith), music education certification, as well as BS and MS degrees in mechanical engineering, all at Carnegie Mellon. She has worked as a research and development engineer for a prominent glass company, later deciding to dedicate herself entirely to musical pursuits.  She has had two orchestral pieces premiered by the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, and has received several commissions for original choral works. She has been a teaching assistant for the Marta Sanchez Dalcroze Training Center at Carnegie Mellon, and is a proponent of the Dalcroze methodology.