Mariah Wilson
Director of Choral Activities, Chair of Conducting
Dr. Mariah Wilson is a conductor passionate about storytelling through musical performance and collaboration in the arts. She has worked at Boston University since 2019 where she is Director of Choral Activities and Chair of Conducting, and with Boston’s Grammy-winning Odyssey Opera since 2017 where she is Assistant Music Director.
Her love of performance began when she entered the Paris Conservatory with a tiny violin and broken French, and quickly expanded to studies in piano and harp. She toured as a pianist giving solo and chamber recitals throughout the United States, and in France, Belgium, and Hong Kong. Following an overuse injury, she began studying voice professionally, singing with the Grammy-winning Oregon Bach Festival Chorus, recording with the Handel and Haydn Society, Analog Chorale, and BYU Singers (Eric Whitacre 2). Her interest in storytelling has also inspired arrangements, non-western transcriptions, and compositions including Biblical song cycles from women’s perspectives and a musical about early settlers of San Francisco.
Having inherited a love of opera from her grandparents, she has been chorus master, music director, or assistant conductor for over thirty operas. She is delighted to be entering her fifth season partnering with one of the most adventurous opera companies in the country, Odyssey Opera. She holds degrees in piano performance and conducting from Brigham Young University and her doctorate in conducting from Boston University, with a dissertation project on “How Choral Music Can Illuminate the Cancer Experience.”
