David Amado has been Music Director of the Atlantic Classical Orchestra since July 2016.
He was recently appointed Artistic Director of the Oregon Mozart Players, based in Eugene, Oregon. In June 2023, after leading the Delaware Symphony Orchestra for twenty seasons as Music Director, he was named the first Music Director Laureate in the DSO’s 120-year history.
As a guest conductor, Amado has led many of the country’s prominent orchestras. In addition to the St. Louis Symphony, where he served as associate conductor from 2001 to 2004, he has led the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Milwaukee, National, New World, and Toronto symphonies. Recent engagements include the Mobile, New Bedford, New Haven, and Toronto symphony orchestras and California’s Symphony Silicon Valley. In June 2019 he made his debut at the Mostly Modern Festival in Saratoga Springs, New York. Highlights of the 2024–25 season included guest engagements with the Oregon Mozart Players and the Hilton Head Symphony, and a return to the Delaware Symphony Orchestra to close its season.
Amado has been praised by the media, audiences, and fellow musicians for his deep musical insight and visceral energy. His recordings on Telarc and Naxos have earned Latin GRAMMY nominations.
He began his musical training in piano, studying in The Juilliard School’s pre-college and college divisions before going on to Indiana University, where he received a master’s degree in instrumental conducting. Returning to New York, he pursued further conducting studies at Juilliard with Otto-Werner Mueller. His first professional post, an apprenticeship with the Oregon Symphony, was followed by a six-year tenure with the St. Louis Symphony, where he served as a staff conductor and as music director of the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra.
