Bakersfield Master Chorale Music Director, Robert Provencio has enjoyed a professional career that now spans more than 35 years during which he has frequently been recognized for excellence in performance and teaching, scholarship, and service. His choirs have performed throughout the North America, Europe, and Australia and have been featured at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Kennedy Center, the Swiss Concert and Cultural Center, and the Sydney Opera House. In the summer of 2014 Dr. Provencio conducted the Bakersfield Master Chorale in the Cathedrals of Venice and Florence and also at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. Dr. Provencio accepted a call to serve as music director of the Bakersfield Master Chorale in 2012 in addition to his work as minister of music at the First Presbyterian Church (since 1995). Provencio has been a long time member of the music faculty at the California State University at Bakersfield. He has conducted hundreds of clinics, workshops, lectures, and performances for schools, churches and professional choirs and their conductors and has appeared professionally at meetings of the American Choral Directors Association, the College Music Society, the National Association of Church Musicians, and at universities from Minnesota to Texas and California to New York.
Recently, Provencio was the recipient of CSU Bakersfield Outstanding Professor award for Leadership and Service. Dr. Provencio chaired the CSUB Music Department and served numerous active terms as a member of the University's Academic Senate and Foundation Board plus the WASC Planning, Steering, and Oversight committees, the NCAA Accreditation and Academic Standards Committees. A former Rotarian, Dr. Provencio was active at the local and district levels in various initiatives aimed at advancing youth.
Dr. Provencio served twelve years on the editorial board of the Choral Journal, the national publication of the American Choral Directors Association. He continues on the Board of Governors of the National Association of Church Musicians where he chaired the publications committee. He is currently working on two book projects; one entitled Releasing the Artist Within and another on choral literature and performance practices. His translation of The History of the Youth Choir & Orchestra Movement in Venezuela was serialized in the International Choral Bulletin. Dr. Provencio has been elected Music Educator of the Year and University Music Educator of the Year at local, sectional, and state levels by the California Music Educators Association. He was named the outstanding graduate in music education from the University of Arizona and the outstanding Hispanic alumnus from Texas State University; his biography is listed in Who's Who in America.
In addition to his responsibilities with the Chorale, the Church, and at the University, Dr. Provencio is the past chairman, and continuing board member, of the Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center Board. He is in constant demand as an adjudicator, clinician, and consultant.