Donald Neuen began his conducting career as a sophomore in college, conducting the collegiate pep band for basketball games and a local church choir. Upon graduating, he directed a middle and high school band and choral program. Then came the life-changing opportunity to become Director of Choral Activities for the highly regarded music program at Shortridge High School in Indianapolis, Indiana—a school with 2,300 students, eight choral ensembles that met daily for credit, two full-time choral directors, and a professional accompanist. Every year the choirs would take part in performances of a musical as well as a major work for chorus, professional soloists, and members of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. During this time, Neuen also conducted the Indianapolis Symphony Chorus and the eighty-voice Maennerchor (German male chorus). These foundational experiences eventually led to positions as Director of Choral Activities for Ball State University, Georgia State University, the University of Wisconsin, the University of Tennessee, the University of California–Los Angeles, and the Eastman School of Music.

In 1960, America’s premier choral conductor, Robert Shaw, began mentoring, advising, and teaching Neuen, a relationship that lasted until Shaw’s death in 1999. Neuen sang in the Robert Shaw Chorale, invited Shaw to guest-conduct his own choruses, and was eventually hired by Shaw to be the Director of Choral Activities and Assistant Conductor for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. In a newspaper interview, Shaw described Neuen’s choral work as “the finest I’ve heard—nothing in New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles compares.”

In addition to his work with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Neuen served as Assistant Conductor of the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra, Artistic Conductor of the Oakridge Symphony Orchestra (Tennessee), and Director of Orchestral Activities for Georgia State University.

Extended private study with musicologists and scholars includes eighteen years with Julius Herford and twelve years with Alfred Mann. Upon hearing Neuen conduct a performance of J. S. Bach’s B Minor Mass, Herford (with whom Robert Shaw studied for thirty years) wrote, “Don Neuen is the great conductor of his generation.” Neuen’s teachers also included Brahms scholar Laura Hoggard, contemporary music scholar Patrick Macy, and the pioneer of Negro spirituals, Jester Hairston.

The governor of Indiana presented Neuen with the highest award given to citizens, “The Sagamore on the Wabash,” for “contributions to the nation through quality choral music.” Neuen’s alma mater, Ball State University, presented him with two outstanding alumnus awards, a proclamation from the dean’s office for an “Outstanding Career in the Choral Art,” and an honorary doctorate. UCLA honored Neuen with its elite Distinguished Professorship Award. And in recognition of outstanding accomplishment and distinguished service to the art of choral music, the coveted Robert Lawson Shaw citation was presented to Donald Neuen by the American Choral Directors Association on February 24, 2023.

Neuen has guest-conducted internationally—including in Europe, Asia, Mexico, and Canada—and in nearly every U.S. state. Performance venues include Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, and the Hollywood Bowl.

Neuen retired from UCLA in 2014, and in 2016, at the age of eighty-four, he fully retired from guest-conducting and from his position as Minister of Music for the internationally televised “Hour of Power” broadcasts.