Biography
Sarah Penicka-Smith
'Simply spine-tingling...'
Jessica Foong, Classikon, December 2020
A passionate advocate for music as a force for change, Dr Sarah Penicka-Smith is a conductor and socially-engaged artist. She is Willoughby Symphony Orchestra’s Associate Conductor.
Sarah made her international debut at The Dallas Opera in 2018 through the Hart Institute for Women Conductors. She has collaborated with Italian conductor Carlo Montanaro for the past seven years.
In 2024, Sarah was one of only six artists and arts workers nationally to be awarded a prestigious Churchill Fellowship. She has recently returned from researching socially-engaged orchestral and operatic models across Europe and the USA, including visits to Santa Fe Opera and the Pueblo Opera Program, the Fundaçion Barenboim-Said, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, and the Refugee Orchestra Project.
Sarah is committed to expanding classical music’s ability to offer social change and cohesion. She received a residency for socially-engaged artists with The Cad Factory, later joining projects in regional Australia. Sarah and her wife Melanie Penicka-Smith produce and direct socially-engaged music projects, including Pacific Pride Choir tours to Germany, Poland, Cambodia and Vietnam, and commissioning and co-creating ‘OCDiva’, Dr Eve Klein’s one-woman opera for mezzo-soprano and OCD advocate Yasmin Arkinstall.
Sarah has held positions with several Sydney choirs, most recently as the founding Artistic Director & Principal Conductor of River City Voices, a symphonic choir in Western Sydney combining access to major choral classics with telling local stories. Her pioneering programs included ‘What The World Needs’, an album of choral arrangements of work by the neurodiverse musicians of Club Weld, and ‘Slam Messiah’, where Handel’s masterwork meets performance poets. She has conducted operas for several Sydney companies, as well as many Sydney orchestras.
As part of the Symphony Australia Conductor Development Program, Sarah worked with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under Maestri Asher Fisch, Johannes Fritzsch, Marko Letonja and Christopher Seaman. Her role as Assistant Chorusmaster with Sydney Philharmonic Choirs saw her working with many conductors, including Maestri Brett Weymark OAM, Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Lorin Maazel.
In demand as an adjudicator and panelist, Sarah serves as a Peer Assessor for Creative Australia, and as a juror for the APRA/AMCOS Art Music Awards. In addition to her musical credits, she holds a PhD from the University of Sydney.
In 2026, Sarah directs the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra in Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang and two Australian premieres. She is grateful to Bilbao Opera, Oslo Philharmonic, the Fundaçion Barenboim-Said, and Göttinger Symphonieorchester, where she is observing rehearsals and community engagement projects throughout the year.
Sarah made her international debut at The Dallas Opera in 2018 through the Hart Institute for Women Conductors. She has collaborated with Italian conductor Carlo Montanaro for the past seven years.
In 2024, Sarah was one of only six artists and arts workers nationally to be awarded a prestigious Churchill Fellowship. She has recently returned from researching socially-engaged orchestral and operatic models across Europe and the USA, including visits to Santa Fe Opera and the Pueblo Opera Program, the Fundaçion Barenboim-Said, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, and the Refugee Orchestra Project.
Sarah is committed to expanding classical music’s ability to offer social change and cohesion. She received a residency for socially-engaged artists with The Cad Factory, later joining projects in regional Australia. Sarah and her wife Melanie Penicka-Smith produce and direct socially-engaged music projects, including Pacific Pride Choir tours to Germany, Poland, Cambodia and Vietnam, and commissioning and co-creating ‘OCDiva’, Dr Eve Klein’s one-woman opera for mezzo-soprano and OCD advocate Yasmin Arkinstall.
Sarah has held positions with several Sydney choirs, most recently as the founding Artistic Director & Principal Conductor of River City Voices, a symphonic choir in Western Sydney combining access to major choral classics with telling local stories. Her pioneering programs included ‘What The World Needs’, an album of choral arrangements of work by the neurodiverse musicians of Club Weld, and ‘Slam Messiah’, where Handel’s masterwork meets performance poets. She has conducted operas for several Sydney companies, as well as many Sydney orchestras.
As part of the Symphony Australia Conductor Development Program, Sarah worked with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra under Maestri Asher Fisch, Johannes Fritzsch, Marko Letonja and Christopher Seaman. Her role as Assistant Chorusmaster with Sydney Philharmonic Choirs saw her working with many conductors, including Maestri Brett Weymark OAM, Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Lorin Maazel.
In demand as an adjudicator and panelist, Sarah serves as a Peer Assessor for Creative Australia, and as a juror for the APRA/AMCOS Art Music Awards. In addition to her musical credits, she holds a PhD from the University of Sydney.
In 2026, Sarah directs the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra in Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang and two Australian premieres. She is grateful to Bilbao Opera, Oslo Philharmonic, the Fundaçion Barenboim-Said, and Göttinger Symphonieorchester, where she is observing rehearsals and community engagement projects throughout the year.
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