Music Director and Conductor

Conductor and violinist THOMAS JOINER is enjoying his 13th season as Music Director and Conductor of the Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared as a conductor, violin soloist, chamber player, and teacher throughout the United States and eleven foreign countries. As Professor of Violin and Orchestral Activities at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina, he conducts the Furman Symphony Orchestra in orchestra, operatic, and oratorio performances each year. He recently completed his 31th season as a member of the Artist-Faculty of the Brevard Music Center where he holds the Dr. & Mrs. William J. Pendergrast, Sr. Artist Chair and serves as a concertmaster of the Brevard Music Festival Orchestra. He was among twelve BMC faculty, along with his wife, violist Anna Barbrey Joiner, to be honored in 2009 with the Distinguished Alumni Award.

Maestro Joiner has performed with prominent conductors Robert Shaw, Jorge Mester, John Nelson, David Effron, Keith Lockhart and James Levine as well as soloists Renee Fleming, Frederica von Stade, Samuel Ramey, Marilyn Horne, David Daniels, Peter Serkin, Emmanual Ax, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Lynn Harrell, Yo-Yo Ma, Mark O’Conner, and Joshua Bell. As conductor, he has collaborated with notable musicians including pianists Lee Luvisi and Yakov Kasman, cellists Andres Diaz and Carter Brey, violinists James Buswell, Stephanie Chase, Laura St. John, and William Preucil, tenors Gary Lakes and Stanford Olsen and soprano Angela Brown. As a 1996 Artistic Ambassador for the United States Information Agency, Joiner presented seventeen violin recitals with pianist Douglas Weeks during a five-week tour of western Africa and the Middle East.

Joiner earned the Doctor of Music in Violin Performance from Florida State University, the Masters of Church Music in Musicology from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and the Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance from Furman University. Previous positions include Associate Principal Second Violin of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, first violinist with the Louisville Orchestra, Professor of Violin and Orchestral Activities at the University of Georgia School of Music, South Carolina president of the American String Teachers Association and member of the national board of directors of the Conductors Guild. In 2001 he spent a sabbatical in France studying with eminent maestro John Nelson, former Music Director of the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris. Joiner is a native of Rock Hill, South Carolina.

“When I first moved to the area, Thomas Joiner was in his third year as Music Director of the Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra and already well along in the task of shaping it into the fine orchestra that it has become nine years later. This year’s Pops concert once again demonstrated Joiner’s skill at crafting programs. It was a thoughtful tribute to the patriotism and humanity of Irving Berlin, one of our Broadway greats. The Friday concert was delivered to a sold-out audience of 900.” - Classical Voice of North Carolina