Official Biography
Victor T. Anstine (1997-) is an award-winning conductor, composer, clarinetist, pianist, musicologist, and managerial musician raised in Green, Ohio in the United States. He attended The Cleveland Institute of Music’s Young Composers Program under the instruction of Dr. Keith Fitch, 2014-2015. Victor was awarded the John Philip Sousa Band Award, as well as a ©National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Emmy® Student Production Award for his film score for Buzzing In The Garage, a film by Nate Laguardia, August, 2017, in Lawrenceburg, Indiana. He has held conducting engagements in Hungary, Vienna, Austria, Italy and The United States
As a composer, he has acquired a spacious composition portfolio of symphonies, piano concertos, suites for an array of instrumentations, tone poems for large orchestra, a Mass in G minor, and is currently working toward completing two semi-seria Italian operas, a German opera seria, a French comedic opera, and a Faust-inspired cantata.
Victor was trained as a large ensemble clarinetist by the Cleveland Institute of Music’s Preparatory Department and Faculty of The Cleveland Youth Wind Symphony. The Cleveland Youth Wind Symphony went on a European Concert Tour under Dr. Gary Ciepluch, playing in Belgium, Austria, and Germany in the summer of 2016, of which Victor served as principal and concertmaster. He played Bass Clarinet, E-flat Clarinet and B-flat/A in the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra under conductor Brett Mitchell, 2015-2016 season.
As a clarinet soloist, Victor was under the tutelage of Professor Jayne Naragon for 4 years, and under Dr. Kristina Belisle Jones, (retired) Principal clarinetist of the Akron Symphony & Professor of Clarinet at the University of Akron School of Music for four years, and Dr. Gail Lehto Zugger, Professor of Clarinet at Capital University Conservatory of Music for his Undergraduate degree.
During this time, he received the influential musical and conducting instruction from Dr. Jeffrey D. Gershman, Director of Wind Ensembles at Capital University Conservatory of Music, now of the College of Wooster, where he played in the top wind ensemble four years consecutively. He has also had the opportunity to rehearse under conductors and composers such as Benjamin Zander, Franz Welser-Möst, Frank Tichelli, Johan de Meij, Michael Markowski, Julie Giroux, and John Mackey.
While he had been studying conducting for almost a decade prior to his undergraduate degree, in his pursuit of a Clarinet Performance Degree at Capital University Conservatory of Music, in Columbus Ohio, United States, Victor began devotedly studying orchestral and operatic conducting, and conductors such as Gustav Mahler, Arthur Nikisch, Bruno Walter, Claudio Abbado, Artur Bodanzky & Leonard Bernstein to name a few, as well as much of the standard, and the forgotten, orchestral repertoire.
Aptly, during the completion of his Bachelor of Music degree, Victor organized, prepared, rehearsed and performed chamber ensemble arrangements of Gustav Mahler’s Eighth, Fifth, *Tenth and *Second Symphonies (*canceled by Covid-19 outbreak). Throughout these years, he began a lifelong study of the production of Opera and Drama, and the importance it holds in society. Mahler, Meyerbeer, Wagner, Berlioz, Beethoven, Rossini, Mozart, Lully, Puccini, Lilli Boulanger, Bellini, Donizetti, Strauss Jr, and Ethyl Smyth are just a few composers he began tirelessly studying. He is also comfortable in the position of Maestro al cembalo. In August, 2021, Victor conducted in the “Luigi Mancinelli Opera Conducting Competition” in Orvieto, Italy, studying and preparing Pietro Mascagni’s opera Cavalleria Rusticana. In July, 2022 he conducted in the first annual “Vienna School Conducting Competition” in Vienna, Austria, studying Franz Joseph Haydn, Anton Webern and Wolfgang Mozart. In addition, Victor embarked on several private recording engagements with string orchestra in Capital University Conservatory of Music Otto Mees Hall. He has conducted works by Amy Beach, Aaron Copland, Percy Grainger, Richard Wagner, Chevalier de St. Georges Joseph Bologne, Giuseppe Verdi, Johann Strauss Jr, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Florence Price, Pietro Mascagni, Gaetano Donizetti, and Gustav Mahler.
In 2022 he was appointed Music Director and Conductor of the Akron Pops Orchestra in Akron, Ohio, as well as the Assistant Conductor of the Euclid Symphony Orchestra under Matthew Salvaggio in Cleveland, Ohio. In 2024, Victor was appointed Pit Orchestra Conductor for the Akron Civic Theatre’s Akron All-City Musical 12th and 13th Season productions.
“Mr. Anstine’s affinity to inspire and create in artistic numbers is something that has always remained paramount to him, and he strives to inspire communities through music and drama, as it has inspired him so tremendously to share the richness of music to create beautiful and authentic performances.”
Affiliates
The Akron Pops Orchestra
Music Director, Conductor and Artistic Coordinator, from 2022
Akron All-City Musical
Pit Orchestra Conductor and Artistic Coordinator, from 2024
Freelance Conducting & Musical Consultation
In skills ranging from musical directing, planning, board membership, collaboration, ensemble management, development, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, and performance consulting, Victor Anstine is available to assist.
