As a conductor, Lidiya Yankovskaya's experience includes work with opera companies, symphonic orchestras, chamber ensembles, and choruses. Currently, Lidiya serves as Music Director of Juventas New Music Ensemble (a professional contemporary music ensemble in residency at The Boston Conservatory), Assistant Conductor with Opera Boston, Music Director at Harvard University's Lowell House Opera, and Staff Conductor with Boston Opera Collaborative.  This season's projects include serving as Music Director for a production of Rimsky-Korsakov's Snegurochka (The Snow Maiden) at Lowell House Opera (the first fully-staged, Russian-language production of the opera in the U.S. and the work's New England premiere).  In addition, Lidiya is currently working as Assistant Conductor on Opera Boston's production of Berlioz's Beatrice and Benedict and Intermezzo Opera's premiere of James Yannatos' opera Rocket's Red Blare.  Other recent projects include Janacek's Cunning Little Vixen with Boston Opera Collaborative , opera Boston's production of Hindemith's Cardillac, Bernstein's Candide at Harvard University's Lowell House Opera, and the world premiere of the opera Light and Power by Isaac Schankler.   Lidiya is also active a pianist and coach.  She regularly performs with singers and serves as the Music Director/Pianist for Opera Boston's education tours and the cover pianist for Opera Boston's mainstage productions.

A native of St. Petersburg, Russia, Lidiya began her studies on piano at the Russian Specialized Music Schools and as a singer in the St. Petersburg Children's Choir at age five. Soon thereafter, she also began playing the violin. Lidiya first performed as a conductor at age seventeen, when she lead her high school orchestra in the first movement of Dvořak's Symphony no. 7.  Lidiya's conducting teachers and mentors have included Kenneth Kiesler, Ann Howard Jones, David Hoose, Joshua Jacobson, Eduardo Navega, and Christine Howlett.  She has also recently participated in workshops and masterclasses with  Gustav Meier, JoAnn Falletta, Erin Freeman, Tamara Brooks, and Simon Carrington.  As a singer with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus (choir of the Boston Symphony), Lidiya has also had the opportunity to perform under the batons of James Levine, Seiji Ozawa, Rafael Frübeck de Bergos, Charles Dutoit, Bernard Haitink, and others. 

Lidiya received her B.A. in Music and Philosophy, Phi Beta Kappa with Departmental Honors, focusing on piano, voice and conducting from Vassar College.  While at Vassar, Lidiya was the Music Director of the Mahagonny Ensemble, an instrumental and choral ensemble (about 55 instrumentalists and 24 singers) that focuses on repertoire from the 20th and 21st centuries. Upon graduation from Vassar, Lidiya received the Francis Walker Prize as the top pianist in her graduating class.  In May 2010, Lidiya received an MM in Conducting, Pi Kappa Lambda, on a Dean's Scholarship from Boston University.  While at Boston University, Lidiya also studied voice with Sharon Daniels, Director of the Boston University Opera Institute.