Matthew Aubin
Conductor
Biography
A passionate musical director, American conductor Matthew Aubin maintains a culture of excellence through a modern approach and an open mind to the diversity of our society.
He is Music and Artistic Director of the Southwest Michigan and Jackson Symphony Orchestras and the Chelsea Symphony (CS) in New York.
Matthew Aubin is recognized as the foremost scholar of French composer Fernande Breilh-Decruck. He has received several research grants to study her life and work. He has revised and created critical versions of her compositions published by Gérard Billaudot. A strong advocate for women composers, he works to promote Fernande Decruck’s recently updated work. Matthew Aubin has produced two major recordings of her works with the Jackson Symphony Orchestra, the first of which has been available to the public since 2022 ( Claves ), and the second expected in 2024.
Parmi ses activités sur la scène new-yorkaise, il a mené des collaborations médiatisées avec l’acteur John Lithgow, la série télévisée primée Mozart in the Jungle et le Muséum d’Histoire naturelle de New York. Il a joué un rôle central dans le développement du concours annuel du Chelsea Symphony pour les compositeurs émergents avec des jurys de haut niveau. Matthew Aubin a dirigé le Chelsea Symphony dès les premières années de la formation de l’ensemble au Lincoln Center. Il a entre autres dirigé les productions New-yorkaises en avant-première d’œuvres de Mark O’Connor, Fazil Say et Caroline Shaw.
As Music Director of the Jackson Symphony Orchestra, Matthew Aubin revolutionized the orchestra’s visibility, both regionally and nationally. He collaborated with world-renowned soloists such as pianist Pascal Rogé, cellist and composer Jeremy Crosmer, cellist Julian Schwarz, and composer Lowell Liebermann. During his tenure as Music Director, the JSO’s season expanded, and the organization now reaches audiences of all ages through expanded family concerts, educational concerts, and the Music on Tap series. During the 2020 pandemic, he launched a series of digital initiatives, beginning with the Random Acts of Music series.
As a consultant for the Amazon Prime series Mozart in the Jungle created by Roman Coppola and Jason Schwartzman, Matthew Aubin served as the off-camera conductor for the episode filmed on Rikers Island. He designed and conducted a series of classical music outreach concerts for inmates, both digitally and in person. He also conducted the film Bel Canto starring Julianne Moore and served as an artistic consultant for the hit television show Younger.
Matthew Aubin continues to practice as a horn player, performing regularly across the country. A passionate educator, he has served as a professor at Washington State University (2011-2015), an adjunct professor at the Hartt School (2008-2011), and as the Director of Educational Programs at the Hartford Symphony Orchestra (2009-2011).
Press
Fernande Decruck: Concert Works, Vol. 2 Crosmer, Kubo, Esfahani, Aubin.
“We must cross the Atlantic in the time of the sad Trump and reach the deep Michigan of Jackson in order to recognize the knowledge and erudition of Matthew Aubin, who reawakens the prematurely interrupted and now forgotten life of Fernande Breilh-Decruck (1896-1954), to rediscover a figure of the French interwar period to whom Olivier Messiaen paid homage when he dedicated “Songs of Earth and Sky” (1938) to her “with all the gratitude and moving memory of the author.”
(…)Throughout this recording, we will appreciate the commitment and fervor of Matthew Aubin, the Jackson Symphony Orchestra and its soloists, who thus contribute, with all their merits, to offering Fernande Decruck the laurels allowing her to inscribe her name on their deserved crown more lastingly than on the fallible rose petals to which many female composers are confined.
(Jacques-Philippe Saint-Gerand) TUNING FORK OF JUNE 2025
Fernande Decruck: Concert Works, Vol. 2. Jeremy Crosmer (cello), Mahan Esfahani (harpsichord), Mitsuru Kubo (vola), Jackson Symphony Orchestra, Matthew Aubin. Claves Records
“Fernande Decruck (1896–1954) is one of the most overlooked composers of the 20th century, yet her works display an astonishing independence of tone and expression. From Paris, she moved to New York. In 1937, she returned to Toulouse with her three children. After the war, she divorced and worked at the Conservatoire de Fontainebleau. Their music represents a unique blend of Old and New World, associated with the neoclassicism of the period: brilliant in the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra (1932), with exotic sonorities in “Les Trianons” for harpsichord and orchestra (1946), with beautifully developed dark lines in the Sonata for Saxophone and Orchestra (1943, performed here with warmth and emotion on the viola), or with lighter textures à la Saint-Saëns in the waltz suite “Les Clochers de Vienne” (1935). The concertos, in particular, are powerful scores and demonstrate an original musical language.”
[Michael Kube] NMZ ( Neue Musikzeitung)
American conductor Matthew Aubin, Music Director of the Jackson Symphony Orchestra, has become passionate about this composer, offering her world premiere recordings. Thus, the second volume of Fernande Decruck’s concert works is now released on the Swiss label Claves.
(…)Let us salute the work of Matthew Aubin and the Jackson Symphony Orchestra in rescuing this endearing artist from oblivion. A tribute from our American cousins to French chic.