photo: Alyssa Wang
Ken Yanagisawa is a Japanese-American conductor whose work spans opera, symphonic, and contemporary repertoire. He is Music Director and Co-Founder of the Boston Annex Players, Associate Conductor of the Boston Civic Symphony, and Assistant Conductor of the New Philharmonia Orchestra. He is also an Assistant Professor of Conducting at Berklee College of Music.
Ken's recent and upcoming engagements include Guest and Cover Conductor appearances with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra during the 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 seasons, Assistant Conductor appointments with the Aspen Music Festival and School in 2026 following his receipt of the 2025 Aspen Conducting Prize, and a return to Japan to conduct Mozart's La clemenza di Tito for Kansai Nikikai’s landmark 100th opera production. He previously made his Japanese debut conducting Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte with Kansai Nikikai and the Japan Century Symphony Orchestra at the Hyogo Performing Arts Center. Additional engagements have included covering and assisting the National Symphony Orchestra, Rhode Island and Plymouth Philharmonics, Berlin Academy of American Music, and Berlin Opernfest, among others.
Ken holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Orchestral Conducting from Boston University’s College of Fine Arts as well as graduate degrees in Conducting from the Manhattan School of Music and a Bachelor of Arts in Music from Yale University. Prior to Yale he attended the New England Conservatory as an Undergraduate Diploma candidate for Oboe Performance under the tutelage of John Ferrillo. His principal mentors include Robert Spano, James Burton, William Lumpkin, George Manahan, and Tatsuya Shimono. Further conducting studies include masterclasses and festivals with Leonard Slatkin, Mark Stringer, Dame Jane Glover, Hugh Wolff, Bernard Labadie, and Gerard Schwarz. He is deeply grateful for all the excellent guidance and mentorship he has received thus far in his life as a musician.
Beyond the podium, Ken has worked extensively in orchestral administration and music libraries, including roles at Boston University and the New York Philharmonic. He is also an accomplished photographer, with work published in TIME, The New York Times, Boston Globe, Playbill, and other outlets.
(As of June 2026)