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Steven Sunderman is the executive director of the Cincinnati May Festival, recently hailed as “America’s Premier Choral Festival.” During his 30-year career at the May Festival and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the May Festival has enjoyed a financially sound history of twenty-four consecutive years of balanced budgets and a 900% increase in its endowment fund value. Artistic highlights have included critically-acclaimed performances, recordings, television broadcasts and appearances at Carnegie Hall, as well as numerous educational projects and community initiatives.
In 2014 the May Festival instituted a shared-services agreement with Cincinnati’s Vocal Arts Ensemble, and Mr. Sunderman assumed the title of executive director for that organization as well. While a student at the University of Cincinnati, he was one of only two dozen students to be accepted into the inaugural class to pursue a bachelor of fine arts degree in dramatic performance at UC’s College-Conservatory of Music. He later received a BBA in finance from the Carl H. Lindner College of Business at the University of Cincinnati.
Mr. Sunderman is a board member of the Society for the Preservation of Music Hall, board secretary of the Greater Cincinnati Choral Consortium, a member of the Cincinnati Cultural Facilities Task Force, and a member of Chorus America’s Leadership Development Forum. In 2014, Mr. Sunderman received The C-Suite Award from Lead Magazine and was named one of Cincinnati’s most influential leaders by Venue magazine. In September 2015, Mr. Sunderman was named as one of Cincinnati’s Gentlemen of Style and Substance for his leadership, philanthropy, and achievement in the Greater Cincinnati community.
