The Department of Music appoints Verena Mosenbichler-Bryant as Director of the Duke University Wind Symphony

Verena Mosenbichler-Bryant has just completed her D.M.A. in Wind Conducting at the University of Texas, Austin. Verena also holds degrees from Michigan State (MM), Anton Bruckner Privat University, Linz, Austria (BA Orchestral Conducting); and from the Landermusikschule, Ried i. Innkreis, Austria (Kapellmeister Certificate). She plays piano, organ, flute, bassoon, cello, and guitar, and during the summers is Executive Director of the International Youth Orchestra Project, Mid-Europe Festival (Schladming, Austria).

According to Stephen Jaffe, Chair of the Department of Music, "Verena Mosenbichler-Bryant delighted our students and faculty during her interview at Duke. She is personable, and most important, a wonderful conductor who will inspire the students to have fun and in return to give to something greater than themselves: music. I'm delighted that Verena has agreed to take this on."

"The Duke Wind Symphony has had a long history of involvement with the city of Vienna," Jaffe said. "A portrait of Duke study abroad students, assembled in Vienna in the mid-1980s, hangs on the wall of the Chair's office. We were not looking for an Austrian conductor, but isn't it a strange and nice coincidence that we've found one?"