Rebekah Heller is thrilled to share her vision from the podium as a conductor of clear and emotionally charged performances. Informed by a robust career as a new music bassoonist, and long-held curatorial and leadership roles in the renowned International Contemporary Ensemble, Heller’s conductorial style is precise, collaborative, and deeply engaging.

Heller’s depth of experience interpreting contemporary music, and building trust with composers, performers, and audiences alike, translates into an exciting presence at the forefront of new music.

Alex Ross, in The New Yorker, wrote of her 2023 Park Avenue Armory concert featuring the music of George Lewis: “the International Contemporary Ensemble, under the direction of Rebekah Heller, lit into the 2013 piece Assemblage, …The ensemble had no trouble adopting (George) Lewis’s turn-on-a-dime energy, conveying a kind of happy exhaustion at the end.”
(see the full concert video below)

“Heller’s crisp direction, sans baton, guided the players through the score’s intricacies, marshaling their energetic reading,” wrote the South Florida Classical Review in response to her 2022 New World Symphony Debut.

 In the Fall of 2024, I Care if You Listen called Heller’s conducting of Courtney Bryan’s gorgeous, vocal-heavy program at Miller Theatre “marvelous.”

2025 highlights include Heller curating and conducting a month-long residency with The Oberlin Conservatory’s Contemporary Music Ensemble and Sinfonietta, her conducting debut at the rigorously curated Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music, in Darmstadt, Germany, and her conducting debut at the TIME:SPANS festival in New York City.