Kevin Stites most recently finished a guest conductor position with the Boston Conservatory at Berklee, music directing a production of City of Angels. Last summer he served as curator/conductor for Everybody Rise: A Stephen Sondheim Concert, with Patti LuPone, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Sutton Foster, Norm Lewis, Sierra Boggess, and Skylar Astin at the Hollywood Bowl, with a 40 voice choir and 60 piece orchestra, and will be conducting Do You Hear The People Sing? at the world famous venue next summer. Recently he made his Chicago Symphony and Ravinia Festival debut conducting Yours, Stephen Sondheim, with Brian Stokes Mitchell, Heather Headley, and Alexandra Billings, and will be returning summer 2024 with the CSO for a Henry Mancini tribute. Kevin also spent six seasons as Music Director for the Radio City Christmas Spectacular. Other Hollywood Bowl appearances include Into the Woods (2019), The Producers (2012), Guys and Dolls (2009), Les Miserables (2008), and Kristin Chenoweth’s solo concert with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Kevin also conducted the L.A.
Philharmonic at Walt Disney Concert Hall with Brian Stokes Mitchell, several Symphonic Concerts with Kristin Chenoweth, and Do You Hear the People Sing? with the Oklahoma City, Hartford, and Dallas (Pop) Orchestras. He was Music Director for Manhattan Concert Productions of Titanic and Crazy for You at David Geffen Hall as well as Broadway Classics at Carnegie Hall, and conducted the mono-opera Falling Man, by Kenneth Fuchs, at the 911 Museum Memorial. He is Music Director/Pianist for Deborah Voigt’s Voigt Lessons. Guest Conductor: Grant Park Symphony (Sondheim, Bernstein, Gershwin, Loesser, Porter, and Lerner and Loewe tributes). For the Rockford Symphony Orchestra he has conducted/curated a John Williams concert, an evening called “Americana” featuring works by Kenneth Fuchs, Florence Price, and Dvorak’s 9th Symphony, and most recently Holiday Pops 2023.
His work on Broadway includes: On the Twentieth Century (Revival), South Pacific (LCT), Tale of Two Cities, The Color Purple (Music Supervision/Incidental Music), Titanic (Original Musical Supervisor/Music Director), Sunset Boulevard, Les Miserables (2006 revival), The Threepenny Opera (Roundabout Revival), Fiddler on the Roof (2003), Nine (Revival), Oklahoma! (Nunn/Stroman Revival), On the Town, Nine to Five (Additional Musical Arrangements). His tour credits: Little House on the Prairie, The Color Purple, Martin Guerre, Miss Saigon, The Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, Titanic. Film/Television: “Rosie Live!,” “Reefer Madness,” “Letterman,” “Rosie,” several Tony Awards Telecasts, 2 Il Volo specials for PBS.
Last fall he conducted and music directed the world premiere of Mr. Holland’s Opus.Kevin earned his Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign, studying under the tutelage of Professors Emeritus Kenneth Drake and John Wustman. He served as a graduate teaching assistant with Opera Illinois, and was awarded the Creative and Performing Arts Fellowship in 1979/80.
For more information, please visit: kevinstitesmusic.com.
