George Chadwick is the first director of the New England Conservatory of Music.

He is succeeded by Wallace Goodrich (1931), Quincy Porter (1942), and Harrison Keller (1947), who is named president in 1953. He is succeeded by James Aliferis (1958), Chester Williams (1962), Gunther Schuller (1967), J. Stanley Ballinger (1977), Laurence Lesser (1983), Robert Freeman (1997), and Daniel Steiner (2000), and Tony Woodcock (2007 to present)