KOJI OTSUKI, was the first-ever guest conductor of the Bach Collegium at the 2019-2020 Season’s Opening Night Concert with two of the three Bs, Bach and Brahms.

Koji is a versatile performer, teacher, and conductor specializing in the historically informed performance of the music of J.S. Bach. His mentors include Helmuth Rilling with whom he studied at Oregon Bach Festival over three festival seasons (Eugene, Oregon) and at Bachwoche 2004 (Stuttgart, Germany) with a scholarship from the Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart. He is also Bach coach and head music librarian at the Marlboro Music Festival, where he collaborates with Mitsuko Uchida and other world-class musicians.

After receiving a Master’s degree in Choral Conducting at Temple University, he studied Bach in Tokyo as a Japanese government fellow under Masaaki Suzuki, director of the Bach Collegium Japan. While in Tokyo, he also studied baroque violin, flauto traverso, baroque voice and early music ensemble with foremost experts of our time. After his return, he continued his study with Stanley Ritchie et al. in a doctoral program at Indiana University Bloomington.

His recent international engagements include Otaru, Japan (Januaries 2015-7), Kaohsiung, Taiwan (January 2016) and Shanghai, China (November 2016), National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei (September 2017), and the Aichi University of the Arts in Japan (Fall 2018). Koji is founding director of the Gamut Bach Ensemble based in Tokyo and Philadelphia, whose concerts are highly-attended in the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society’s concert series.

Please help us welcome him to our Fort Wayne Bach Collegium family.