Michael Stepniak is a broadly trained artist, educational innovator and higher education leader. As a soloist and chamber musician, Stepniak has performed in major concert halls and venues in eleven countries, been featured on National Public Radio, recorded for the Centaur Records label, performed frequently with the Mendelssohn Piano Trio, as a member of the National Philharmonic String Quartet, the Contemporary Music Forum, and the Razumovsky String Quartet, and has collaborated with various leading chamber musicians, ranging from Ann Schein, Earl Carlyss, and Lory Wallfisch, to Arlo Guthrie. Hailed by papers such as the Washington Post for his “tremendously poised” and “transcendent” performances, Stepniak grew up in Australia and, at the age of fifteen, left his home country to pursue musical studies in North America. 
 
As an educator and author, Stepniak is engaged in national conversations about arts and training. He is president-elect of the College Music Society (CMS); has served on the board of directors of International Council of Fine Arts Deans; has advised and consulted with leaders from a range of institutions including the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Rice University; and is a member of ICFAD’s Diversity and Inclusion Committee. He is the lead author of the recent volume Beyond the Conservatory Model (Routledge & College Music Society) and is editor of the in-publication volume A More Promising Musical Future: Leading Transformational Change in Music Higher Education (Routledge & CMS). 
 
Stepniak serves as dean and professor of music at Shenandoah Conservatory, where he strives to attract and support mischief makers. He oversees over 200 faculty and staff and around 700 students enrolled in 27 degree programs across music, theatre and dance, as well as a 1,200-student arts academy. Beyond being home to multiple national-leading performance programs, Shenandoah Conservatory is also one of the country's leading performing arts schools when it comes to student-led work and collaborative projects.
 
Stepniak completed his award-winning studies in violin at New England Conservatory, musicology at Northwestern University, viola at Peabody Conservatory, and doctoral studies in the interdisciplinary fields of aesthetics, arts education and leadership at Harvard University. He is a member of the alpha chapter of Pi Kappa Lambda.