DMA, Choral Music, University of Southern California
MA, Music Education, Columbia University
BM, Music Education, Western Michigan University
John K. Russell, DMA is the Director of Choral and Vocal Studies at Palomar College and the Music Director of the San Diego Master Chorale. As Music Director of the SDMC, Dr. Russell conducts and coordinates all artistic activities of the chorale, which include preparing the chorus for performances with San Diego Symphony and other San Diego orchestras including the Mainly Mozart Festival Orchestra and La Jolla Symphony. At Palomar College, he conducts the Chamber Singers and the Palomar Chorale, teaches applied voice and oversees the vocal music program. In addition, he serves on the summer conducting faculty at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey where he teaches master classes in conducting for the annual Westminster Summer Choral Festival and recently coordinated hundreds of San Diego choral singers for the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s Big Sing California at Copley Symphony Hall for the largest choral music event in the history of the state.
Dr. Russell is also frequently in demand as a tenor soloist and was recently noted for his “heart-melting legato”. His recent solo performances include Hector Berlioz’s Te Deum with the San Diego Symphony, St. John Passion (Evangelist) with Pepperdine University, Carl Orff's Carmina Burana with the Lisbon Summer Choral Festival Chorus and Orchestra in Lisbon, Portugal, Handel’s Acis and Galatea with the Bach Collegium San Diego and Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 with the Westminster Summer Choral Festival and Piffaro: The Renaissance Band in Philadelphia, PA.
Dr. Russell was previously the Director of Choral Activities at California State University, San Bernardino, and has held similar positions at Albion College (Michigan), Los Angeles City College, Cypress College and the San Diego Children’s Choir. Prior to his work in California, Dr. Russell was the principal choral conductor at the LaGuardia School of Music & Art and Performing Arts (the Fame School) in New York City. At LaGuardia he was the assistant chairperson of the Music Department, conductor of the symphonic chorus and voice instructor for the school’s advanced vocalists. While in New York he conducted in over twenty performances with the world-renowned Orchestra of St. Luke’s, served as a clinician for the New York Philharmonic’s Education Department and was a guest conductor with New York City National Chorale.
Dr. John Russell is a native of Kalamazoo, Michigan and is a graduate of Western Michigan University and Columbia University. He received his Doctorate of Musical Arts in Choral Music from the University of Southern California. His primary conducting mentors are Craig Arnold, Joe Miller and Jo-Michael Scheibe and he has studied voice with William Appel, Curt Peterson, Jeanne Goffi-Fynn and Gary Glaze. He currently resides in San Diego with his wife, Jill and son, Parker.