Dominican conductor Gabriela Gómez Estévez is Assistant Professor and Director of Orchestras at Cornell University. Gómez Estévez has has forged and international career as a performer andfervent champion of new music and diversity of repertoire. In 2021, she founded Operability, an annual opera festival dedicated to presenting innovative and inclusive works for voice and chamber ensemble. Through this platform, she has forged dynamic artistic and educational partnerships, commissioning and premiering works by emerging composers. Recent and upcoming collaborations include projects with the Newphonia Ensemble, Constantinides New Music Ensemble, Cornell University, Opera Ithaca, and Ithaca College.

In 2023, Gómez Estévez was awarded the James Conlon Conductor Prize as a conducting fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and School, earning an invitation to return in 2024. She made her conducting debut with the National Symphony Orchestra of the Dominican Republic in January 2024, and has recently collaborated with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra. Engagements this season include appearances with the National Symphony Orchestra of the Dominican Republic and the Richmond Symphony.

Gómez Estévez has appeared and performed internationally, including engagements in Spain, Panama, Louisiana, New York, San Francisco, Boston, and her native Santo Domingo. She also led the Cornell Orchestras on their most recent tour, which included a performance at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall in Boston.

Dr. Gómez Estévez’s research focuses on the symphonic works of Dominican composer Margarita Luna García, offering critical historical and cultural context while expanding access to Luna García’s music. Her scholarship—supported by the Dominican Studies Institute at CUNY and the Latin GRAMMY Cultural Foundation—includes the reconstruction, orchestration, and preparation of Luna García’s unpublished orchestral and piano works for performance and publication. Upcoming projects include a research symposium and performance festival at Cornell University in March 2026, which will spotlight music from Hispaniola through a series of public concerts and community engagement events.

She holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Orchestral Conducting and a Master’s in Flute Performance from Louisiana State University, as well as a Bachelor’s in Flute Performance from Berklee College of Music. Her principal conducting mentors include Robert Spano, Kenneth Kiesler, Scott Terrell, and Damon Talley.