Christopher Dawes

CHRISTOPHER DAWES’ musical life and ministry span genres, ideas, playing for royalty and the homeless, serving and seeking across what some consider to be musical divisions and segregated worlds.  He has given solo recitals and accompanied choral tours across North America and Europe, and been broadcast repeatedly on domestic and international radio services.  He is a noted collaborative keyboardist and choral conductor, a veteran theatre musician and composer, and the frequent guest of jazz combos, gospel choirs, praise bands, contemporary music and opera companies. His work appears on over two dozen commercial CDs to date and has been heard in Canada’s greatest concert halls and organ lofts.

Currently he divides his professional time between freelance performing across a wide spectrum of the Toronto and Southern Ontario music scenes, and several musical leadership positions. He is Director of Music to Rosedale Presbyterian Church in Toronto, Music Director of the 18-voice a capella Marion Singers of Greater Toronto, accompanist to both the Orpheus Choir of Toronto and the choral and orchestral conducting programs of U of T’s Faculty of Music, and Artistic Director to his hometown choir, the 90-voice Georgetown Choral Society.  He has served as a Director of Canada’s Summer Institute of Church Music (Whitby, Ontario) since its 2005 Session.

Chris’ passion is discovering and sharing all that is interesting and inspirational in music.  Following upon graduate work in Music Criticism (area: Musical Genre) in the mid-2000s he gives papers, lectures and pre-concert chats on topics he finds, and that find him - and blogs and podcasts at ideasaboutmusic.ca.  In 2012 he founded Chroí, a 4-piece Celtic crossover band that still finds its audience in churches, concert halls and cultural festivals across southern Ontario. Originally from near Kingston, Ontario, Chris lives with his wife Marcia and their three children in Georgetown.