Rhode Island native John Masko is a rapidly rising conductor who works with professional and semi-professional orchestral ensembles around the U.S. He is currently music director of the Providence Medical Orchestra and Coro Dante in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and associate conductor of the Wellesley Symphony Orchestra (a capacity in which he won the 2021 American Prize in conducting).

He frequently serves as an assistant and cover conductor with orchestras including the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Boston Ballet, and Symphony New Hampshire. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he helped found and music directed the National Virtual Medical Orchestra, an online ensemble of medical professionals from around the country that was featured, among other venues, on Live with Carnegie Hall and PBS NewsHour.

John holds a master’s degree in conducting from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Dr. Eric Dudley. He has also studied conducting with Charles Peltz at New England Conservatory. John has conducted in masterclasses led by Sian Edwards, Paavo Järvi, and Jorma Panula, and has assisted conductors including Michael Tilson Thomas, Krzysztof Urbanski, Osmo Vänskä, and Mischa Santora. In 2021, he was conducting fellow at the Atlantic Music Festival in Waterville, Maine.

John is also active as a music writer and critic, serving for two years as the San Francisco-based opera reviewer for Parterre Box. Outside of music, he fancies himself as maker of the best gumbo north of the Mason Dixon Line and is a devotee of the novels of Thomas Hardy..