Nan Washburn just celebrated her 27th season as Music Director of the Michigan Philharmonic and will be performing for the 10 th time at the NWMF this year. She is the winner of The American Prize in Orchestral Conducting, professional division 2013, The American Prize Ernst Bacon Memorial Award for the Performance of American Music, professional division, 2016, and 19 ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming from the League American Orchestras.
Under her leadership, the Michigan Philharmonic was also the 2025 Winner of the American Prize in Professional Orchestral Performance. She first came to national attention as a co-founder, the Artistic Director, and Associate Conductor of the San Francisco-based Women’s Philharmonic. As a leading authority and advocate for orchestral works by women, she serves on the board of the Women’s Philharmonic Advocacy, has been recognized with the Distinguished Service Award from New York Women Composers; the Outstanding Local Hero Award from KQED, San Francisco; the Jeanine C. Rae Award from NWMF in 2016 and in 2021 she was named as one of Crain’s Detroit Notable LGBTQ in Business. At NWMF she has conducted the world premieres of Kay Gardner’s Ouroboros in 1994, Mary Watkins’ The Initiate in 2016, and Cara Haxo’s Remember in 2022.