“Conducted by Cynthia Woods, the Zwillich was dynamic and immersing…” exclaimed John Galigour of the Sun Valley News, after witnessing the Pacific Coast premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Ellen Taffe Zwillich’s work Upbeat with the Grande Rhonde Symphony.

A violinist by training, Ms. Woods turned her attention to the podium in her early twenties and opportunities soon followed. Her career has taken her across the country and overseas, performing with groups such as the Plevin Philharmonic, the Rocky Mountain Chamber Players, the Transylvania Symphony Orchestra, the Greater Newburgh Symphony and the Varna Philharmonic.

Recent accomplishments include the Boston premiere of Joan Tower’s Concerto for Violin with Avery Fisher Career Grant winner Peter Zazofsky, the premiere of a new arrangement of Alec Templeton’s Pocket Size Sonata by Larry Wolfe of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the upcoming CSO 35th Anniversary Celebration Commission of 2009 Rome Prize winner, Lisa Bielawa. Ms. Woods has also founded the summer Pops on the Lawn concert series featuring the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra in the heart of historic Cambridge.

Her opera debut was made in a series of sold out performances of Bernstein’s On the Town at the Center for Performing Arts at Reinbeck, New York. An advocate of contemporary American music, she has worked with some of today’s most significant composers including Joan Tower, John Corigliano and George Crumb and was chosen to be a Fellow at the prestigious Atlantic Center for the Arts.

In addition to her experience as a guest conductor Ms. Woods has been the Music Director for the Boston Community Chamber Orchestra and the Artistic Director for the Worcester Youth Orchestras-where she created and oversaw a seven year educational partnership with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She was appointed the Music Director of the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra in 2006.