Isaiah Jackson

Jackson suffers from sensorineural hearing loss. The inner ear damage cost him most of the hearing in his right ear in 1995 and began to affect his left ear in 2004. The hearing loss forced him to retire from conducting in 2006.

In October 1994, he was a guest speaker of the National Press Club of Australia.

While conducting in Rochester, he met his wife Helen Tuntland, president of Hochstein School of Music & Dance and a consultant in the field of music education. They have three children, Benjamin, Katharine and Caroline. In 1987, he and his family moved to Hammersmith, London. He acknowledges he is an anglophile and he has conducted before members of Britain's royal family on several occasions. He speaks five languages.

He won the first Governor's Award for the Arts of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 1979; and in 1991 he was awarded the Signet Society Medal for Achievements in the Arts, awarded by the Signet Society of Harvard University.

He has been a guest conductor with orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, 1978; San Francisco Symphony, 1984; Detroit Symphony Orchestra, 1983 and 1985; Cleveland Orchestra, 1983-84, 1986-87, and 1989-92; Boston Pops, 1983 and 1990-92 (he was the orchestra’s first black conductor, and the first black conductor to lead the annual "Gospel Night" program), Toronto Symphony Orchestra, 1984 and 1990; Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, 1985 and 1988; BBC Concert Orchestra, 1987; and the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, 1989-91. He has also conducted the Vienna Symphony (European debut, July 1973), Houston Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony, Grant Park Festival Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra and the Louisville Orchestra

In 1973, at Leonard Bernstein’s suggestion, he was named as artistic director of the Vienna Youth Music Festival. He was the first person of color to conduct the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra. He is a particular favorite in Australia, having been principal guest conductor of the Queensland Orchestra in Brisbane for three years and of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra. He has also led the Sydney Symphony, West Australian Symphony, Tasmanian Symphony, Adelaide Symphony, and Melbourne Symphony orchestras. He is also Musician in Residence at the Memorial Church, Harvard University.

Jackson founded the Juilliard String Ensemble and was its first conductor 1970-71. He was associate or assistant conductor with the American Symphony Orchestra (1970-71) where he worked with Leopold Stokowski; the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (1971-73); and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (1973-87). He was appointed music director of the Flint Symphony Orchestra (Flint, Michigan) in 1982, the first black music director of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra in 1987 (where he conducted Dayton's first-ever performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 8, Symphony of a Thousand), and principal conductor of The Royal Ballet, Covent Garden, in 1986, and became its music director 1987-90. He was the first black and the first American to occupy a chief position with the company.

Jackson studied Russian history and literature at Harvard University, from which he graduated cum laude in 1966. While there, he had the opportunity to conduct Mozart’s opera Così fan tutte, which helped him decide to pursue music as a career. Subsequently, he went to Stanford University and received his M.A. in music in 1969. He studied with Nadia Boulanger in Fontainebleau, France, before going to the Juilliard School in New York City, from which he graduated D.M.A. in 1973. He also studied at Aspen, Colorado and Tanglewood. At Harvard, he is a Fellow in the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute.

Isaiah Allen Jackson (born 22 January 1945) is an American conductor who served a seven-year term as conductor of the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra of Boston, of which he has been named Conductor Emeritus. He was the first African-American to be appointed to a music directorship in the Boston area. Dr. Jackson currently teaches at the Berklee College of Music, the Harvard Extension School, and the Longy School of Music.