Beatrice Jona Affron first arrived at Pennsylvania Ballet in 1993 as Assistant Conductor. Later, she was promoted to Resident Conductor, and in 1997 she became the Company's Music Director and Conductor. Ms. Affron has conducted many ballets by George Balanchine and other classics, including Giselle, The Firebird, Romeo and Juliet, and The Sleeping Beauty. In 2004, she led the world premiere of Christopher Wheeldon's Swan Lake.

Ms. Affron is heard regularly in a large and varied repertoire that encompasses works from Handel, Donizetti, Philip Glass, and others. In 2002, she received international attention when she led the world premiere performances of Glass and Mary Zimmerman's Galileo Galilei at Chicago's Goodman Theater and on a tour to London's Barbican Theatre. Prior to that, Ms. Affron conducted the Boston Lyric Opera and Chicago Opera Theatre productions of Glass' Akhnaten. In 2005, she made her debut with the Glimmerglass Opera conducting a new production in French of Donizetti's Lucie de Lammermoor.

Some of Ms. Affron's past engagements have included Dominick Argento's opera Miss Havisham's Fire with Opera Theatre Saint Louis, Strauss' Die Fledermaus with the Boston Lyric Opera, and Hansel and Gretel and The Tender Land at New England Conservatory.  She has led Boston's Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra in two concerts and last summer conducted the Boston Landmarks Orchestra at the Hatch Shell on the Esplanade.

A native of New York City and a graduate of Yale University, Ms. Affron studied conducting privately with Robert Spano and at New England Conservatory (where she later served on the faculty) with Pascal Verrot. Ms. Affron also has worked with Gunther Schuller, Jorge Mester, and David Effron. In 1996, she received the Conductors' Guild Thelma A. Robinson Award. Her involvement in contemporary music has included conducting in the Music at the Anthology Series in New York City and leading the national tour of Philip Glass' Les Enfants Terribles in fall 1997. From 2001 to 2004, Ms. Affron served as cover conductor with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.