Emil de Cou has been a productive and popular contributor to Washington-area music since his 2000-’03 term as National Symphony Orchestra associate conductor. Though he divides much of the year between his homes in San Francisco and Seattle, where he is the music director of the Pacific Northwest Ballet, he returns frequently to D.C. The NSO @ Wolf Trap Festival conductor also presents the orchestra’s free summer concerts at Carter Barron Amphitheatre in Rock Creek Park.

As if de Cou were not sufficiently busy as a Smithsonian guest lecturer and preparing a multimedia production at the Seattle Opera House, he is music director of Virginia Chamber Orchestra. The ensemble’s concert on Mother’s Day marks the culmination of a project he has been working on for several years with musicologist Paul Meecham, president and CEO of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.