Roderick Cox

Conductor

Winner of the 2018 Sir Georg Solti Conducting Award by the U.S Solti Foundation, German based American conductor, Roderick Cox, has been praised as a conductor who is “paving the way” (NBC News) and recognized as a “trailblazer…a conductor who will be amongst the vanguard” (Minnesota StarTribune). Cox has gained international attention for recent appearances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Houston Grand Opera, and Philharmonia Orchestra (London).

Through his passion for education and diversity and inclusion in the arts, Cox started the Roderick Cox Music Initiative (RCMI) in 2018 a project to help provide scholarship funds to young musicians of colour from unrepresented communities, allowing them to pay for instruments, music lessons and summer camps. Cox and his new initiative be featured in an upcoming PBS/FilmNorth documentary called Conducting Life, premiering May 2020.

Born in Macon, Georgia, Cox attended the Schwob School of Music at Columbus State University, and then later attended Northwestern University graduating with a master’s degree in 2011. He was awarded the Robert J. Harth Conducting Prize from the Aspen Music Festival in 2013 and has held Fellowships with the Chicago Sinfonietta as part of their Project Inclusion program and at the Chautauqua Music Festival, where he was a David Effron Conducting Fellow. Roderick Cox was appointed as Associate Conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra under conductor Osmo Vänskä in 2016 for three seasons having previously served as assistant conductor for a year.