Malcolm J. Merriweather

Baritone, Conductor

GRAMMY-nominated conductor Malcolm J. Merriweather is Director of the New York Philharmonic Chorus and Music Director of New York City’s The Dessoff Choirs and Orchestra. He is Professor and the Tania León Endowed Chair of Music at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

Renowned as an interpreter of symphonic choral masterworks, Merriweather has led major performances of Bach’s Mass in B minor, St. John Passion, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and Handel’s Messiah, and is recognized internationally for his advocacy of Margaret Bonds, with world premiere recordings of The Ballad of the Brown King, Credo, and Simon Bore the Cross (AVIE Records). He has guest-conducted ensembles including the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, Novus Orchestra, and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra.

Highlights of his 2026–2027 season include preparing the New York Philharmonic Chorus for in 5 exciting programs for Maestro Gustavo Dudamel including John Adams’s On the Transmigration of Souls, Verdi’s Tosca, and Bernstein’s Mass. He returns to The Dessoff Choirs, to conduct Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms, newly edited choral arrangements and completions by Margaret Bonds, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, and prepares the chorus for two appearances with Andrea Bocelli at Madison Square Garden.

The 2025–2026 season featured four world premieres: David Lang’s The Wealth of Nations and Ellen Reid’s Earth Between Oceans with the New York Philharmonic Chorus, Mark Campbell and Peter Boyer’s A Hundred Years On with The Philadelphia Orchestra and The Crossing, and the title role in Frederick with Music Worcester. In celebration of his tenth season with the Dessoff Choirs, Dr. Merriweather conducted Howells’s Requiem, Hailstork’s The World Called, Bach’s Mass in B Minor with period orchestra, a reprised of Tania León’s It’s a journey, and appeared twice with Andrea Bocelli at Madison Square Garden.

Dr. Merriweather opened his 2024–2025 season at Disney Concert Hall with music of Mary Lou Williams for Solange Knowles’s Glory to Glory: A Revival of Devotional Art; conducted Brahms’s Requiem at Town Hall for the Dessoff Choirs’ centennial with Will Liverman and Joélle Harvey; lead the Buffalo Philharmonic in Paul Moravec and Mark Campbell’s Sanctuary Road and Margaret Bonds’s Montgomery Variations; lead the Dessoff Choirs centennial with Verdi’s Requiem at Trinity Church with Angela Meade, J’Nai Bridges, Won Whi Choi, and Kevin Short; and prepared the Caramoor Festival Chorus for Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.

He led the world premiere of Handel: Made in America at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, staged performances of Craig Hella Johnson’s Considering Matthew Shepard with Trinity Wall Street, and prepared the New York Philharmonic Chorus for Jaap van Zweden in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for the reopening of David Geffen Hall. In China, he prepared the New York Philharmonic Chorus for the world premiere of Émigré with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra.

Dr. Merriweather has conducted at Jones Hall, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Disney Concert Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Westminster Abbey, and the Vatican before Pope Francis. He served as founding Artistic Director of Voices of Haiti, a children’s choir established by the Andrea Bocelli Foundation in Port-au-Prince and was previously on the music staff at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

Dr. Merriweather is also an accomplished baritone. Broadway World raved that he “gave a gripping rendition of ‘This Side Up-Henry ‘Box’ Brown,’” in the Carnegie Hall world premiere performance of Paul Moravec’s Sanctuary Road with the Oratorio Society of New York.

Dr. Merriweather earned degrees from Eastman, Manhattan School of Music, and Syracuse University, and was a fellow at Tanglewood. Connect with him on social media @maestroweather and at malcolmjmerriweather.com.

“…and from the New York Philharmonic Chorus, directed by Malcolm J. Merriweather, which leaned into Ravel’s rich tonal colors.” – The New York Times

“…a double chorus (well drilled by the director Malcolm J. Merriweather).” – The New York Times

“One of the most engaging features of the Dessoff Choirs, its ninth Music Director. Mr. Merriweather…radiates charm, intellect and warmth. That he is accomplished is evidenced by his many excellent performances…What I find especially engaging is his total command of his work coupled with his obvious connection to the singers. He conducts without wasted motions. It’s a pleasure to watch him (and hear him sing and play the organ) and a delight to listen to the chorus as they respond.” – New York Arts

“A rich and rewarding evening of choral music.” “…the chorus sang with conviction, expressivity and evident passion, confident both in themselves and in Merriweather’s leadership of them…If We Remember, as Merriweather’s first concert as Dessoff’s music director and conductor is any indication, Merriweather’s just-begun tenure bodes well for Dessoff’s future not just in New York City, where it is a regular fixture on the musical scene, but nationally and beyond as well.” - TheaterScene.net

Sanctuary Road, The Oratorio Society of New York at Carnegie Hall (2018)

“The Oratorio Society of New York commissioned and performed the Carnegie Hall world premiere of SANCTUARY ROAD (subtitled ‘An Oratorio Based on the Writings of William Still, a Conductor for the Underground Railroad’), by composer Paul Moravec and librettist Mark Campbell, It was filled with energy, humanity and, of course, musicality from all involved, including the chorus itself–a riveting wall of sound–and a quintet of gorgeous soloists: Laquita Mitchell, Raehann Bryce-Davis, Dashon Burton, Joshua Blue and Malcolm J. Merriweather.” – Broadway World

“Baritone Malcolm J. Merriweather gave a gripping rendition of ‘This Side Up-Henry ‘Box’ Brown,’ which recounts the twenty-six hours Brown spent in a shipping crate. Merriweather, singing that ‘it’s worth every second’ for ‘just a chance, the slightest chance, the dimmest hope’ that he will arrive safely, compelled the audience to share the experience with him through the force of his gravity and dignified expression.” – Opera News

Malcolm J. Merriweather, baritone, was also excellent, especially in his solo as Henry ‘Box’ Brown, who escaped in a crate marked ‘this side up’ but spent twenty-six hours upside down and tossed about. In one of the rare moments of sardonic humor, he sung with eloquence his final line ‘if only these fools could read.’ – New York Concert Review

‘…and the soothing baritone of Malcolm J. Merriweather brought the score to life for us, together or in solo.’ -Broadway World