As a conductor, bassoonist, and impassioned arts leader, Rebekah Heller’s multifaceted career has one clear throughline — creating and sharing new music with a generosity of spirit that invites and welcomes new audiences at every turn.

Trusted by the world’s most commissioned living composers to lead precise and exciting performances of their music, Heller has conducted over 50 world premieres to critical acclaim.

‍The New Yorker praised the way she “lit into” a stirring rendition of George Lewis’ Assemblage at the Park Avenue Armory with The International Contemporary Ensemble. Heller’s conducting debut with The New World Symphony was heralded in the S. Florida Classical Review as “Crisp” and I Care if You Listen called her leadership on the podium at Courney Bryan’s Miller Theatre Portrait Concert “Marvelous.”

In recent seasons Heller has held curatorial and conducting roles at The Oberlin Conservatory and the Darmstadt Summer Courses, along with featured appearances on the podium at the TIME:SPANS festival in NYC.

 Called "an impressive solo bassoonist" by The New Yorker, Heller is a sought after solo artist — donning commissioned clothing and using custom lighting, she creates a visual spectacle while playing the most complex music from memory, drawing audiences into her exciting and physically embodied performances. As comfortable as she is playing the gnarliest of notated new musics, Heller is just as comfortable in the free improvisation space, collaborating with artists from across the musical spectrum at venues like NYC’s experimental music hub, The Stone. In 2018, Heller made her solo debut with the New York Philharmonic, and has been a featured soloist with the Seattle Symphony, as well as at the Tokyo-based Born Creative Festival, Miller Theatre’s Portrait Concerts, the Kanazawa Contemporary Music Festival, and Harvard University’s Radcliffe series. 

 A curious and unceasing advocate for the bassoon as a solo instrument, Heller has worked side-by-side with dozens of composers to forge an exciting new repertoire of works for solo bassoon, bassoon ensemble, and bassoon with electronics. Many of these compositions can be found on her solo albums: 100 names, which was called "pensive and potent" (The New York Times), and METAFAGOTE, which ArtMusicLounge insists is “here to explode…any preconceived notions you may have had about bassoon music.”  In 2024, Heller released a collaboration with Steve Reich — a multi-track bassoon piece called Grand Street Counterpoint (on which Reich and Heller are co-producers) — along with her first solo EP featuring her own compositions, ONE, on Relative Pitch Records. Her latest album Righteous Rage, featuring a range of bassoon ensemble pieces that Heller commissioned or arranged played entirely by Heller herself, debuted in 2026 on Cantaloupe Records.

A member of the esteemed International Contemporary Ensemble since 2008, Heller has long been on the forefront of experimental music. Her tenure in the ensemble started as a bassoonist, but quickly expanded to encompass deeper roles — including fundraising, curation and then, in 2018, Co-Artistic Director. This leadership role saw Heller working with top presenting organizations across the world, overseeing commissioning programs, curating up to 100 concerts a season, and empowering her fellow artists in the ensemble to embrace a more collaborative leadership structure.

Heller has been on the faculty of The Mannes School of Music at The New School since 2019, where she leads a bassoon studio, co-chairs the wind department, and teaches classes in contemporary repertoire, improvisation for classical musicians, and new music practices. A passionate and committed mentor, Heller is invited to give classes, lectures, and workshops across the globe. She gives talks on topics as wide-ranging as collaborative practices, conscientious curation, contemporary bassoon techniques, and composing for the bassoon, as well as intensive seminars on non-traditional career paths and how to create and sustain community-centered spaces in music. She has given classes at The Juilliard School, The Royal Conservatory in Brussels, The Manhattan School of Music, the Oberlin Conservatory, The Peabody Institute, Ensemble Connect, the Chicago Civic Orchestra and The New World Symphony, among many others. Heller often participates in mentorship programs for female-identifying, trans, and non-binary composers and performers, most recently serving as a mentor in the Blueprint Program — a partnership between The Juilliard School and National Sawdust for young composers.

Heller earned degrees from The Oberlin Conservatory and the University of Texas at Austin, followed by stints at the well-respected training orchestras The Chicago Civic and New World Symphony.

Learn more at rebekahheller.com