Amelia Hollander Ames is in her first year as the conductor for the ISO Trinity-Florentine Orchestra. She is also the founder and artistic director of Con Vivo, a not-for-profit organization that produces free chamber music concerts in the diverse neighborhoods of Jersey City, NJ. In its four years of existence, Con Vivo has received grants from the American Music Center, Jersey City and Hudson County Departments of Cultural and Heritage Affairs, Meet the Composer, and the Virgil Thomson Foundation, as well as support from a large number of local individuals and institutions.
Amelia is a passionate educator and conductor. She is on faculty at the Third Street Music School Settlement (her alma mater) and has taught, conducted and coached at Summer Interlude at the Brearley School, City & Country School, and the Hasadna Conservatory in Jerusalem. In the summers of 2008 and 2009, Amelia traveled to Mexico with Cultures in Harmony, where she conducted the Youth Orchestra of the Ollin Yolitzli Cultural Center in Mexico City and worked with indigenous communities in Michoacan.
From 2004—2007, Amelia was the violist of the award-winning Israel Contemporary String Quartet (ICSQ), with whom she performed throughout Israel and on tours to the U.S., Canada, and Asia. With the ICSQ, Amelia collaborated with composers such as Josef Bardanashvili and Steve Reich, as well as in genre-bending productions with luminaries of the Israeli dance and theater worlds. The ICSQ was regularly featured on national television, radio and in print media. Amelia also performed with the Tel Aviv Soloists Ensemble and the Carmel Quartet during her time in Israel, and recorded for the Tzadik label.
Amelia has collaborated with violists Garth Knox and Tabea Zimmermann, and premiered music written for her by Judd Greenstein and Jim Lahti. She has performed at such festivals as IMS Prussia Cove, the Singapore Arts Festival, Kneisel Hall, and Schleswig-Holstein, and toured Europe and Asia several times with the Verbier Festival Orchestra and Arcos Chamber Orchestra.
Amelia earned her M.M. in Viola Performance at the New England Conservatory. While at NEC she also did significant coursework in the Contemporary Improvisation Department, and was a member of the Boston Modern Orchestra Project and the late, great Joe Maneri’s Boston Microtonal Society. She received her Bachelor of Music from the Eastman School of Music. Amelia was a dedicated member of Eastman’s Balinese Gamelan and Ossia, the student-run new music ensemble. With Ossia, she recorded Steve Reich’s Music for Large Ensemble, released by Nonesuch Records in 2001.
Amelia lives in Jersey City with her husband Christopher, who teaches in the NYC Public Schools, their baby son Griffin, and two dogs.
Email: Amelia Hollander Ames
