ABOUT ME
ABOUT ME“Things that make life beautiful and meaningful: love, smiles, laughs, hugs… kindness… people, animals, good food, travel, and music… There is so much beauty and inspiration to find in nature—the pristine swans on Lake Constance floating so elegantly (while under the surface they’re actually working hard and paddling vigorously)… the clouds surrounding Luzern’s Mt. Pilatus that create a new and unique picture every single day… the warmth of the sun and the sound of the Mississippi on a beautiful summer day on Memphis’s Mud Island… the wide and vast views and perspectives in the lonely North Dakota flatlands that I lose myself in on the daily as I stare outside my backyard… and the New England lighthouse that I am manifesting to one day own, and where I will get sealocked during high tides with nothing but a good score and an annoyingly cute cat…”
Dr. Kevin F.E. Sütterlin is an internationally sought-after conductor and pedagogue. He belongs to Beyond Artists, a coalition of artists that donates a percentage of their concert fees to organizations they care about.
Sütterlin is Director of Orchestral Activities and Opera and Associate Professor of Conducting at Concordia College. Under his direction, The Concordia Orchestra has won the prestigious American Prize in 2018-19. They also received two EMMY awards for the nationally broadcast Concordia Christmas Concert productions in 2016.
Sütterlin is Music Director of the Fox Valley Symphony Orchestra—one of Wisconsin’s finest professional orchestras—winner of the prestigious American Prize in the Professional Orchestra division 2023. Sütterlin himself wont 2nd prize in the professional orchestra conducting category.
Together with his best friend, Dr. Mathias O. Elmer, he is Music Co-Director of Sinfonietta Memphis, an ensemble that provides free concerts and educational experiences for the Greater Memphis communities. Celebrating the orchestra’s tenth season, and perhaps the only orchestra in the U.S. with a co-directorship model, Sinfonietta Memphis’s conductors Elmer and Sütterlin proudly represent the orchestra’s credo: friendship through music. They also co-direct The Sinfonietta Academy for Historically Informed Performance Practice which has recently been recognized as one of the country’s leading period performance practice institutes.
In 2019, Sütterlin was named Principal Guest Conductor of the Qingdao Concert Hall Symphony in China, and in 2021 Honorary Conductor of K-Classic Orchestras, a Korean organization dedicated to contributing to world peace through musical and cultural exchange. Sütterlin furthermore serves as Principal Guest Conductor of Fargo-Moorhead Opera, where he recently directed productions of Rossini’s La Cenerentola and Humperdinck’s Hänsel and Gretel to great acclaim, and regularly conducts their opera gala.
Considering himself a “citizen of the world,” Sütterlin has been building musical bridges across four different continents and has led his ensembles on many successful national and international tours. He has performed and taught across the globe including Austria, Bulgaria, China, Germany, Greece, Italy, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, and the United States. He has taught at Shanghai Conservatory, Sichuan Conservatory, Ocean University Qingdao, University of Cape Town, University of Hawaii, Musikhochschule Luzern, University of Memphis, Purdue University, and Virginia Tech University.
With a great love and passion for teaching, Sütterlin is also Artistic Director of the Northern Valley Youth Orchestras, and holds The Phyllis and Richard Duesenberg Endowed Orchestra Chair of the Lutheran Summer Music Academy and Festival, directing the organization’s orchestral and conducting programs. He has been recognized as one of the country’s leading conducting pedagogues, being praised for his keen analytical eye and deep understanding of conducting technique and physique, paired with a kind and caring approach that has empowered over 150 conductors and conducting students across the globe so far. At Concordia College, Sütterlin is currently designing a brand-new, one-of-its-kind undergraduate degree and curriculum in orchestral conducting. Talented young conductors have already flocked to Concordia from across the globe to study with Sütterlin in a program prototype for the past six years. He is a much sought-after clinician for regional, state-wide, national, and international music festivals and workshops.
Championing the music of living as well as historically under-represented composers, Sütterlin commits to broad and diverse programming on every single concert with all of his ensembles. Using his own funds, Sütterlin commissions between three to six new works every single year. He has commissioned and recorded works of numerous living composers, including Jessie Montgomery, Anna Clyne, Missy Mazzoli, Stella Sung, Theresa Martin, Christopher Ducasse, Evan Williams, Reena Esmail, René Clausen, Ben Krause, Mark Buller, Brianna Ware, Bao Yuankai, Adam Hochstatter, Dan Perttu, Paul Cravens, Russ Peterson, and Doug Harbin, among many others. He has been recognized as one of the world’s leading scholars of the music of late American composer Dominick Argento, sharing a close friendship with Argento until his death in 2019.
Sütterlin’s recording collaborations include numerous CD and DVD productions. From 2011 until 2018, he served on the board of directors of the Zurich Music Association Switzerland, re-designing training curricula for both amateur as well as professional musicians that fit the needs of the 21st century. Sütterlin further serves on the board of the Miller Family Music Education Scholarship through the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley Region.
Sütterlin received his doctorate and master’s degrees in orchestral conducting from The University of Memphis where he studied with Dr. Pu-Qi Jiang and Michael Stern, and a bachelor’s degree in conducting from the Hochschule Luzern—Musik, Switzerland where he studied with Prof. Christoph Rehli and Maestro Douglas Bostock. Furthermore, he has earned a certificate in Inclusive Teaching and Diversity Leadership from Concordia College. Sütterlin is an awardee of the Hirschmann Foundation Prize of Switzerland, the Hendrickson Fine Arts Grant, the University of Memphis International Research scholarship, and the University of Memphis Creative Achievement Award.
In his free time, Sütterlin loves to spend time with his wife April and their three cats. He loves traveling and learning from different cultures. Sütterlin is a Super Mario afficionado—daily references to the game in rehearsals substantiate this claim. The introvert’s secret life goal is to one day own a lighthouse in which he could get stuck during high tides and study scores while listening to the crashing waves.
BIOGRAPHY