Robin Fountain is Emeritus Professor of Conducting at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music. He has accepted engagements to conduct in America, Europe and Asia, including concerts with the Singapore Symphony, the Louisiana Philharmonic, the Tennessee Philharmonic, Traverse City Symphony, the Sudettic and Opole Philharmonics (Poland), Holy Trinity Symphony (Haiti), the Kemerovo and Omsk Philharmonics (Russia), and many others. He led the Tomsk (Russia) Philharmonic on a tour of China in 2003. He has recorded for Parma/Naxos, Novona, and Blue Griffin records, most recently Michael Kurek’s Symphony No. 2 with the European Recording Orchestra, Sofia, Bulgaria.
Under Fountain's direction, Vanderbilt University Orchestra was invited to perform at the MENC: The National Association for Music Education, and on two extended tours of China. He won the university-wide Madison-Sarratt Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching and the Blair School of Music’s Faculty Excellence Award. His final concert at Blair (Britten’s War Requiem) may be viewed here. The Ensemble Musician,a monograph on the art of ensemble playing he wrote with Vanderbilt Wind Symphony conductor Thomas Verrier, is published by GIA Publications.
In 2020, Professor Fountain concluded a fourteen-season tenure as Music Director of Southwest Michigan Symphony. Under his artistic leadership the orchestra created a summer series (the Water’s Edge), a choral partnership (the SMSO Symphony Chorus), and a teaching program for underserved youth (Music Makers). He had previously enjoyed an equally long and productive tenure with the Williamsport Symphony in Pennsylvania.
Robin Fountain was educated at Oxford University, The Royal College of Music in London (where he studied with Norman Del Mar and Christopher Adey), and at Carnegie Mellon University. He was an Aspen Conducting Fellow and was later privileged to have the opportunity to train with members of the famed Berlin Philharmonic at The Conductors Lab in Aix-en-Provence.