Teresa Cheung is the Altoona Symphony Orchestra’s 11th Music Director. In addition, she is assistant conductor for the American Symphony Orchestra, conductor for Empire Opera and music director and conductor for the Manhattan College Orchestra. She began her conducting career as apprentice conductor of the Nashville Symphony Orchestra, and for six years she served as resident conductor for the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor of the Evansville Philharmonic Youth Orchestra and Evansville Philharmonic Chorus. During her tenure in Evansville, Cheung played a major role in the musical life of the community. Amongst her many initiatives, she led the Evansville Philharmonic Youth Orchestra on its first international concert tour to Japan in 2002. A strong advocate for music education for all ages, Cheung has created numerous innovative concerts and lectures for educational programs with the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra. She has been conducting master classes for the Meet the Artists series at Lincoln Center in New York City since 2007. Cheung is equally at home with orchestral and choral genres and is in frequent demand for symphonic, choral, and operatic productions, including the world premiere of Ruth Schonthal’s opera Jocasta. She served as the rehearsal conductor for Marc Blitzstein’s Regina and the first US fully staged production of Robert Schumann’s Genoveva while serving as assistant conductor to Maestro Leon Botstein at the Bard SummerScape and the Bard Music Festival. Recent guest conducting appearances include Bard Music Festival with the American Symphony Orchestra, Altoona Symphony Orchestra, Antara Ensemble, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra, and Phoenix Symphony. A native of Hong Kong, Cheung earned her MM in Conducting from the Eastman School of Music. She is the recipient of the JoAnn Falletta Conducting Award for the most promising female conductors.