Christopher Dragon is music director of the Wyoming Symphony and resident conductor of the Colorado Symphony, which he joined in the 2015–16 season as associate conductor. For three years before that, Mr. Dragon held the inaugural position of assistant conductor with the West Australian Symphony, where he was mentored by Asher Fisch.

Mr. Dragon has a versatile portfolio ranging from live-to-picture performances including Nightmare Before Christmas, Toy Story, and Star Wars: Return of the Jedi; a wide variety of collaborations with artists such as Wu-Tang Clan, Cynthia Erivo, and Joshua Bell; to standard and contemporary orchestral repertoire such as Danny Elfman’s Violin Concerto, Eleven Eleven. Recent highlights include performances of Danny Elfman’s music from the films of Tim Burton, with Elfman reprising the role of Jack Skellington, and performances with Nathaniel Rateliff at Walt Disney Concert Hall and David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center. He made his San Francisco Symphony debut in March 2022.

With songs that run the gamut from heartbreaking to satirical and a host of unforgettable film scores, RANDY NEWMAN has used his many talents to create musical masterpieces widely recognized by generations of audiences.

After starting his songwriting career as a teenager, Mr. Newman launched into recording as a singer and pianist in 1968 with his self-titled album Randy Newman. Throughout the 1970s, eighties, and nineties, he released several acclaimed albums including 12 Songs, Sail Away, Good Old Boys, Little Criminals, Born Again, Trouble in Paradise, Land of Dreams, and Bad Love. Beginning in 2003, Nonesuch Records has released three Randy Newman songbook volumes, featuring solo recordings of songs from throughout his five-decade career, as well as Harps and Angels, and the Randy Newman: Live in London CD/DVD. His most recent Nonesuch album is Dark Matter.

In addition to his solo recordings and regular international touring, Mr. Newman began composing for films in the 1980s. The list of movies he has worked on includes The Natural, Awakenings, Ragtime, all four Toy Story pictures, Monsters, Inc. and Monsters University, Seabiscuit, James and the Giant Peach, A Bug’s Life, and Meyerowitz Stories.

Mr. Newman’s many honors include seven Grammys, three Emmys, and two Academy Awards, as well as a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013—the same year he was given an Ivor Novello PRS for Music Special International Award. Mr. Newman was presented with a PEN New England Song Lyrics of Literary Excellence Award in 2014.