Watch Video

Sara Jobin made history in 2004 as the first woman to conduct on the mainstage subscription series at San Francisco Opera. She conducted performances of Puccini's Tosca with Carol Vaness in the title role and Wagner's Flying Dutchman with Juha Uusitalo and Nina Stemme; the following season she conducted multiple performances of Bellini's Norma. Jobin has also led performances for the San Francisco Opera Center. Prior to her six years as an assistant with the San Francisco Opera, she conducted for Opera San Jose for four years. Her recording with Frederica von Stade of the music of Chris Brubeck has recently come out on the Koch International Classics label; it features the Tassajara Symphony, an organization she led for four years after its founding in 1998. She has also conducted the Orchestra of St. Luke's, Edmonton Symphony, Calgary Philharmonic, The Women's Philharmonic, Oakland East Bay Symphony, San Jose Chamber Orchestra, Dayton Philharmonic, and Toledo Symphony. At age 16 she attended Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges, where she was named a Leonard Bernstein Music Scholar. After graduation, as a John Knowles Paine Travelling Fellow, she studied conducting with Charles Bruck at the Pierre Monteux School. In 1999 she was the first recipient of the JoAnn Falletta Award, given by The Women's Philharmonic in recognition of a young female conductor of outstanding promise.