Jason Harris, conductor

 

Dr. Jason Harris is Assistant Professor of Choral Conducting and Director of Choral Ensembles at the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, where he conducts the Oberlin College Choir, Oberlin Treble Ensemble, Oberlin Musical Union, and teaches choral conducting. In 2006 he received two GRAMMY® Awards (“Best Choral Performance” and “Best Classical Album”) as a choral director for the critically acclaimed Naxos recording of William Bolcom’s monumental Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

From 2002 to 2011 Dr. Harris served as Assistant Conductor of the University Musical Society Choral Union, a symphonic community chorus based in Ann Arbor that frequently appears with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. In this capacity Dr. Harris has prepared the chorus for performances under conductors such as Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra, Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony, Sir Neville Marriner, Leonard Slatkin, Neeme Järvi, James Conlon, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, and composer John Adams.

To meet the growing demand for performances of early music in Michigan, Dr. Harris founded Audivi Vocem, a 20-voice chamber ensemble dedicated to the interpretation of rarely heard sacred works of the Renaissance. Recent performances include Tomás Luis de Victoria’s Officium Defunctorum, and motets by Hans Leo Hassler, Leonhard Lechner, Heinrich Schütz, and Roland de Lassus.

In 2010 Dr. Harris was one of two conductors in the nation selected by Chorus America to participate in a joint Chorus America/League of Symphony Orchestras conducting master class, hosted by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus with Robert Spano and Norman Mackenzie. Dr. Harris has participated in numerous master classes, working with such conducting luminaries as Helmuth Rilling, Matthew Halls, Ragnar Bohlin, Gustav Meier, Jeffrey Kahane, John Alexander, and Charlene Archibeque.

Dr. Harris holds the Bachelor of Music degree in Conducting from Chapman University (CA), and the Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in Conducting from the University of Michigan, where he served as Assistant Conductor of the UM Chamber Choir, UM Men’s Glee Club and UM Women’s Glee Club, and conductor of the Residential College Singers, Arts Chorale, Orpheus Singers, and UM Opera Chorus. Dr. Harris has also served on the faculties of Oakland University (MI), Oakland College (MI), and Schoolcraft College (MI). His teachers include Jerry Blackstone, Theodore Morrison, and William Hall.

Download bios and high-resolution photos by visiting the Press Room.

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2013 ILLUMINATION TOUR PERFORMANCE:

Oberlin College Choir &
Oberlin Baroque

Brick Church

Saturday, January 19th, 2013
2:00pm Concert

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