Jason Love
Artistic Director

Jason Love is an orchestral conductor, concert cellist, video projects creator, and educator.

In his twenty-four year tenure as Music Director and Conductor of the Columbia Orchestra, he was praised for his “intelligent and innovative programming” by the Baltimore Sun, calling the orchestra “Howard County’s premier ensemble for instrumental music,” and noting that “Love has the musicians playing not only with verve and passion, but with an awareness to enter into the emotional core of the works they perform.”

His many awards and accolades include the American Prize for Orchestral Programming, a “Howie” Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Arts in Howard County, MD, a Peabody Conservatory Alumni Achievement Award recognizing outstanding contributions to Music in Maryland, and honorary citations by the State of Maryland and Howard County General Assembly.

 As a cellist, Mr. Love has performed a wide array of concertos with orchestras including the U.S. premiere of Guillaume Connesson’s Cello Concerto, the North Carolina premiere of Tan Dun’s multi-media work, The Map, and performances of concertos by Shostakovich, Dvořák, Bloch, Haydn, and Boccherini. His many chamber recitals included work with the Columbia Orchestra Piano Trio for more than a decade, and he is part of the Franklin-Love Duo with pianist Rachel Franklin.

For the past several years, Love has developed, curated, and edited many filmed projects to share great music with a wider audience and to increase its impact and understanding. He has edited concert performances, filmed informative discussions of music, and expanded his film and video projects beyond the world of classical music.

 As an educator, he has inspired more than a generation of young musicians. Love was Artistic Director of the Greater Baltimore Youth Orchestras (now the Baltimore Symphony Youth Orchestras) for thirteen years, overseeing a program of four orchestras and leading tours to Austria, Japan, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Estonia. During his tenure, the Bridges Program was created to provide instruments, lessons, and orchestra to Baltimore City students who were not being adequately served. Mr. Love also served as conductor of the Repertory Orchestra of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony in Annapolis, MD for four years.

In his eleven years on the faculty of the Governor’s School of North Carolina he taught Twentieth-Century music, philosophy, and other subjects to academically gifted high school students. He led the McDaniel Orchestra Camp in Westminster, MD and the Baltimore String Orchestra Camp. He maintains a studio of private cello students of all ages and has adjudicated and guest conducted at music festivals around the country. 

Love began his career as the Music Director of the New Horizons Chamber Ensemble, an acclaimed new-music group in Baltimore, MD. He has guest conducted a wide variety of ensembles such as the Baltimore Symphony, Washington Sinfonietta, Hopkins Chamber Orchestra, Maryland Classic Youth Chamber Orchestra, and RUCKUS, a contemporary music ensemble at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County where he taught conducting for seven years. He is a graduate of the Peabody Conservatory where studied cello with Ronald Thomas and conducting with Frederik Prausnitz.