Biography

Jiannan Cheng is the newly appointed Assistant Conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and currently serves as the Music Director of Orchestra Concordia. Her career spans symphonic and operatic repertoire, with previous positions as Conducting Fellow at the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Miami Symphony Orchestra, and as Assistant Conductor with the Vienna Summer Music Festival, City Lyric Opera in New York, and Opernfestspiele Heidenheim in Germany.

She has worked with esteemed ensembles such as the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, Stuttgart Philharmonic, Filarmonica de Stat Oradea, Dalasinfoniettan, Orchestra Giovanile Luigi Cherubini, Georgian Chamber Orchestra Ingolstadt, and Munich Chamber Orchestra, among others. In 2024, she won 1st Prize at the Hugo Alfvén International Conducting Competition in Sweden and 2nd Prize at the Orchestra’s Conductor Competition in Romania, and was a Finalist in the Arthur Nikisch Conducting Competition. She was also chosen to participate in The Dallas Opera’s Hart Institute for Women Conductors in the 2024–25 season.

Cheng holds degrees from the China Conservatory of Music, the University of Washington, the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, and Hochschule für Musik und Theater Munich. Additionally, she has received mentorship from world-renowned conductors such as Kurt Masur, Riccardo Muti, Marin Alsop, Mei-Ann Chen, Markus Bosch, Mark Gibson, Nicolás Pasquet, and Johannes Schlaefli.