Andrés Franco

Andrés Franco is in his fourth Season as Music Director of the Philharmonia of Kansas City and has been recently appointed Assistant Conductor of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Franco has been increasingly active as a conductor in the U.S. and South America. His diverse performance experience includes conducting the premiere of “Escenas Convergentes”, a work written by Luis Franco involving symphony orchestra, soloists and folk musicians as well as dancers and multimedia; and “Invierno Porteno”, a co-production of the Philharmonia of Kansas City and the Kansas City Ballet School, where he appeared as piano soloist and conductor performing music by Astor Piazzolla.

Andrés Franco studied conducting with Maestros German Gutierrez and Nicholas Uljanov and has participated in master classes with renowned Conductors such as Maestros Miguel Harth-Bedoya, Leonard Slatkin, Gerard Schwarz, Victor Yampolsky and Helmut Rilling. Born into a family of musicians, he started his studies under the direction of his father Jorge Franco as well as composer Luis Franco and pianist Lise Frank. He received a Bachelor’s Degree in Piano Performance from the Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia. In 2002 Mr. Franco completed a Master’s in Piano Performance as a student of Van Cliburn Gold Medalist Jose Feghali. He also received a master’s degree in Orchestral Conducting from Texas Christian University. During his studies he served as the Assistant Conductor of both the TCU Symphony and the Youth Orchestra of Greater Fort Worth.