ABOUT OUR DIRECTOR

Timothy Newton is the newly appointed Music Director of the Catskill Choral Society. As a choral singer, he has sung with the London Symphony Chorus, the Philharmonia Chorus and Chamber Chorus (London), the Chelsea Opera Group and, most recently, the BBC Symphony Chorus in all of London’s major concert venues, the Edinburgh Festival, Oxford, Cardiff, Paris, Lille, and the Canary Islands under some of today’s finest conductors, including Sir Colin Davis, Sir Charles MacKarras, Sir Roger Norrington, Richard Hickcox. Daniel Gatti, Stephen Cleobury, Robert Dean, and Marin Alsop to name a few.

Dr. Newton has sung early music with the Boston Bach Ensemble, the 10-voice Capella Alamire (Boston), and the Baroque Artists of Champaign (Illinois). As a conductor and accompanist, he served an apprenticeship with Pittsburgh Opera under Theo Alcantara, as choral master and pianist with Ithaca Opera, as a symphonic pianist with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, and as keyboard artist with the King’s Brass.

His main activity as a pianist is coaching and accompanying singers in all types of music.

Dr. Newton is a dedicated educator, having taught and conducted at several academic institutions including Dartmouth College, Grinnell College, the American School in England, the University of Illinois, Huntington College, and Moody Bible Institute (Chicago).

This past summer, he joined the New York Summer Music Festival faculty and this fall begins an appointment as Assistant Professor of Music at the State University College of New York at Oneonta as a conductor and teacher.

Timothy’s research has focused on symphonic choral music, performance practice issues, conducting and conductors, and music of the 17th and 18th centuries, for which he received the Nicholas Temperley Award from the University of Illinois (2004) and the Julius Herford Prize from the American Choral Directors Association (2005).

He is a founding Associate Editor of the National Collegiate Choral Organization’s online journal, The Choral Scholar.

Tim graduated with honors in piano and conducting from Ithaca College and earned a doctorate in choral conducting and literature from the University of Illinois. He has studied conducting with some of the field’s leading pedagogues including Helmuth Rilling, Margaret Hillis, Elmer Iseler, Jon Washburn, Thomas Baltner, Fred Stoltzfus, and William Weinert in symposia and masterclasses.