Rachael Worby

Galvanized by the legendary conductor Leonard Bernstein, her activist upbringing, and the view that “orchestras belong to the community,” Worby harnesses the power of the arts to affect change in every level of society. From her hands-on work with school children in New York’s public school system as Music Director and Conductor of the Young People's Concerts at Carnegie Hall, to her four-year stint on the National Council on the Arts as an appointee of President Bill Clinton, to her current post as Artistic Director, Conductor and Founder of California’s pioneering MUSE/IQUE, Rachael brings her passion, boundless energy, and versatile command of musical genres including symphonic, operatic, pops, jazz, rock, blues, gospel, light classics, and 20th century fare to create memorable, one-of-a-kind live multi-disciplinary events that expand the cultural landscape.

A versatile communicator who honed her vision of community not only in the United States but also through numerous guest conducting engagements throughout Europe, South America, Australia and Asia, with MUSE/IQUE Rachael has achieved her vision of opening and enlarging a conversation about community. A twenty-first century non-profit organization, MUSE/IQUE brings together members from every part of the community, connecting performers and audiences through curated experiences designed to challenge preconceived notions about the concert-going experience, and “illuminate the world around us.” Reimagining the endless possibilities for live music, MUSE/IQUE’s eclectic, inclusive and dynamic events take place in unexpected, non-traditional venues throughout the Los Angeles area. MUSE/IQUE offers an untraditional policy of in-the-round seating with no intermissions and no backstage areas, thereby eliminating barriers and strengthening the bond between performers and audiences, creating an intimate experience for all.

Highly respected as an arts educator, Rachael’s belief that arts education and community engagement are an essential part of an organization is a focus of MUSE/IQUE’s mission. Through an expansive, carefully curated outreach program, the organization has developed strong, ongoing immersive relationships with 14 separate nonprofits throughout the Los Angeles area, including the Ability First, Academy of Music for the Blind, Hathaway-Sycamores, Hillsides, Learning Works, Pasadena Senior Center, Performing Arts for All, Professional Child Development Associates (PCDA), Rose Bowl Aquatics (Camp Splash), Urban Compass, Urban Voices, and Villa Esperanza Adult Day Program that include season performances.

Ultimately, MUSE/IQUE aims to deep connections within a community and bridge meaningful understandings of one another. "We imagined, to the best of our ability, what community meant person-by-person," says Worby. "For our definition, it was going to mean everybody. Live music is a basic human right. Whether or not you're a homeless person or a battered person, or you're a person of great wealth or a person of struggling means, you deserve to have great live music in your life." Particularly noted are the energy of the events, the sense of fellowship, and Worby's unusual conducting style. "I'm not sure if you've seen her conducting—she's like a ball of fire," says Dr. Charles Elachi. "People come out so inspired from one of her events."

One example of uniting art with unusual community spaces is "GIRL/BAND," a 2013 program centered on female jazz musicians. The program included a screening of "The Girls in the Band," a documentary film about the trials women faced in the jazz industry from the 1930s to present day, and performances by contemporary female jazz players; all of this was held beside the lipstick-laden conveyer belts of the Avon Distribution Center in East Pasadena, Calif. The Avon factory workers, who attended and also volunteered at the event, were also honored during the program. "Sometimes we look for a community that is resonant, literally, with the idea," says Worby. "[Avon] is a cosmetics company, but its slogan is 'The Company for Women.'" By bringing together two seemingly disparate things, MUSE/IQUE makes people think more deeply about the music they are hearing and overturn preconceptions, whether about the music itself or the environment around them.

In 2011, Rachael Worby and a group of community leaders founded MUSE/IQUE, a counter-conventional orchestra in Pasadena reimagining the concert-going format to create an accessible, smart, and fun musical experience.

MUSE/IQUE is a dynamic, nonprofit organization that creates exhilarating live music adventures. Using the whole city as a venue, MUSE/IQUE goes way beyond the concert hall with spectacularly intimate performances which combine music, movement and ideas from a diverse range of genres. Under the leadership of renowned Artistic Director Rachael Worby, MUSE/IQUE's artistic collective consists of an acclaimed orchestra and top musicians from the worlds of jazz, rock, blues, gospel, and more, along with today's best singers, dancers, and thinkers. Together with an enthusiastic and growing audience base, these artists reimagine the possibilities for the live music experience. Founded in 2011, MUSE/IQUE is a membership driven organization presenting nine major public events each year as well as a wide range of education and community engagement programs.

Since 2011, MUSE/IQUE has become a major cultural presence in Pasadena that reaches a broad and diverse audience. Notable MUSE/IQUE guest artists have included Jessye Norman, Angela Bassett, Rickie Lee Jones, Arturo Sandoval, Flea, Savion Glover, Charlie Haden, Steven Page, Patti Austin, Mary Wilson, Kevin McHale, Charles "Lil Buck" Riley, Joshua Henry, Laurence Juber, Mirai Nagasu, Nnenna Freelon, Darlene Love, Ballet Hispánico, John Hammond, Tommy Emmanuel and Colin Hay.

She enjoys a musical relationship and personal friendship with American soprano Jessye Norman. They appear together at music festivals and concert halls throughout the world. At Jessye Norman's request, Worby conducted the China Philharmonic Orchestra in Beijing and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra in 2006 and served on the Honorary Committee of Carnegie Hall's HONOR! Festival in 2009 as Artistic Advisor and guest panelist.

Worby returned to California and worked as music director of the Pasadena POPS from 2000 to 2010, where she continued her work as a dedicated orchestra builder. Her leadership increased the number of annual concerts and audience attendance while simultaneously securing ongoing funding to institute free-to-the-public concerts and expand outreach programs to underserved communities.

She married Governor Gaston Caperton in May 1990. While coninuing to serve full-time at both the Wheeling Symphony and Carnegie Hall, Worby took on several additional projects as First Lady of West Virginia. She created and hosted the nationally acclaimed Arts and Letters Series, an admission-free, live series, broadcast on public television which presented Carl Sagan, Tom Wicker, Jesse Jackson, Bob Woodward, Taylor Branch, Harry Belafonte, The American Boy Choir and dozens of other notable individuals. She also led the statewide campaign, "Thanks A Million", to raise one million dollars to eradicate illiteracy and created The Governor's School for the Arts in perpetuity.

Rachael Worby received a presidential appointment to the National Council of the Arts, on which she served for four years. In 1990, she was nominated for an ACE Award for two young peoples' orchestra programs she created, narrated and conducted for the Disney Channel.

In 1986, she eclipsed hundreds of applicants for the position of Music Director and Conductor of the Wheeling Symphony Orchestra. She was one of the handful of women worldwide honored with that title. In her seventeen years of leadership, the Wheeling Symphony increased its programming from six annual concerts to forty. This included regional touring and the creation of a Pops series and released the orchestra's first CD. "Rachael turned us into a professional institution," said Susan Hogan, former Executive Director of the Wheeling Symphony. "She's able to shift from one side of the brain to another and can tell you how much each company has contributed for the past 10 years. Of course, she had to fight, being a female conductor--and a Jewish urban woman--in a town with a heavy union atmosphere and old money. But art and harmony through conflict . . . that's life."

After working as a Conducting Assistant for the Spokane Symphony for two years, she became the Assistant Conductor for Youth Concerts at the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1984 to 1987 and excitedly accepted her childhood idol's former position, Music Director of Carnegie Hall's Young People's Concerts, which she led for twelve years "In the last 15 years, she's grown tremendously, demonstrating to the world that she's a musician, first and foremost." said Ernest Fleischmann, former Executive Director and General Manager of the LA Philharmonic, in an interview at the time to the Los Angeles Times.

She holds a bachelor of arts degree in piano performance from the Crane School of Music at the State University of New York at Potsdam and began graduate work in musicology, at Indiana University and Brandeis University. Spurred to further her training as a conductor, Worby directly appealed to Jacques-Louis Monod. Though he insisted that there would never be a woman on an orchestra podium, Monod provided weekly private lessons to Worby from 1976 to 1981. When she completed this training, she turned to Max Rudolf and Otto Werner-Mueller for additional study.