Walter Morales is starting his third season as as Music Director of the Edgewood Symphony Orchestra. He is the Music Director and Conductor for the Carnegie Mellon Contemporary Ensemble since 2003. He is also Assistant Director of Orchestral Studies at Carnegie Mellon University as well as Assistant Conductor for the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic. Since 1998 he has worked closely with the Opera Theatre of Pittsburgh as music director cover conductor, coach, rehearsal pianist, and music coordinator. He has been a guest conductor with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica, Pittsburgh Youth Symphony Orchestra, Wheeling Symphony Orchestra, McKeesport Symphony Orchestra, Altoona Symphony Orchestra, Three Rivers Young People's Orchestra, Helix New Music Ensemble, Rutgers Chamber Orchestra, Rutgers Opera, and Charleston TheatreWorks Company.
His first recording featuring George Crumb’s Makrokosmos III: Music for a Summer Evening with members of the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic under the direction of Juan Pablo Izquierdo is available on Mode Records. In June 2007 this recording received the Diapason d’Or, the most prestigious phonographic award in France.
In April 2005, Mr. Morales was a finalist for the post of Assistant Conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, chosen out of 180 applicants from all over the world. This past summer he was the Assistant Conductor for the first Pittsburgh production of Wagner's Ring Cycle by the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. In August 2005, he has performed at the last three National Flute Conventions with such artists as Lior Eitan, Wissam Boustany, and Gary Schocker. He has been associate conductor for the Rutgers Opera, and has also worked as accompanist for the Pittsburgh Symphony, Pittsburgh Opera, Mendelssohn 
Choir, Opera Theatre of Pittsburgh, Chatham College, and Charleston Opera. He has collaborated with such artists as Cuarteto Latinoamericano, Sarah Chang, Midori, Alexander Kerr, Walfrid Kujala, Jennifer Larmore, Julianne Baird, Herbert Perry, Anne Panagulias, and Meir Rimon.
Walter Morales has performed in solo and chamber music recitals in Maryland, Washington, D.C., North Carolina, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and in New York City at Weill Recital Hall, Steinway Hall, and at Lincoln Center. He has won prizes at the University of Costa Rica Concerto Competition, the Carlos Enrique Vargas Piano Competition, the Southeastern Community College Competition, the MTNA South Carolina State Competition, the Silbermann Chamber Music Competition, the Carnegie Mellon Concerto Competition, the Pittsburgh Concert Society, and has appeared at the "Semanas Musicales de Frutillar" in Chile, the Piccolo Spoleto Festival, the Jill Watson Festival of the Arts, the International Piano Series and the Rutgers SummerFest.
He has performed as soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica, Symphony Orchestra of Chile, Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, Carnegie Mellon Virtuosi, Carnegie Mellon Contemporary Ensemble, Princeton Pro Musica, Charleston Symphony Orchestra, International Piano Series Orchestra, College of Charleston Orchestra, and University of Costa Rica Chamber Orchestra. Mr. Morales began his piano studies at age fifteen at the School of Music of the University of Costa Rica with Maria Clara Cullell. In 1994 he graduated from the College of Charleston as a student of Enrique Graf. In 1997, he completed a Master of Music degree from the Mason Gross School of the Arts of Rutgers University with Ilana Vered. He has also studied with Maria Curcio Diamand, Nybia Marino, and Margarita Feodorova. In 2002, he completed an Artist Diploma and a Master of Music in Orchestral Conducting at Carnegie Mellon's School of Music where he was a student of Juan Pablo Izquierdo.
We are excited and pleased to share this season with you and invite you to come hear us perform.
As always, we thank you for your continued support and look forward to seeing you at our concerts.
