This is Matthew Larkin’s fifth season as Music Director of the Ottawa Choral Society. During his tenure he has conducted the Choral Society in a number of major works including Bach’s Magnificat, Mozart’s Coronation Mass, Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, Palestrina’s Pope Marcellus Mass and the Mass in G Minor by Ralph Vaughan Williams, as well as works by Canadian composers Healey Willan, Derek Holman, Imant Raminsh and Larysa Kuzmenko to name but a few. In the 2008-09 season, he led the choir in an impressive performance of the rarely performed 40-part motet Spem in alium by the master of the English Renaissance Thomas Tallis. He prepared the choir for performances of Verdi’s Requiem and Handel’s Messiah for the National Arts Centre Orchestra, and Ein Deutsches Requiem by Johannes Brahms for the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra. With commissions from the Ottawa Choral Society, Mr. Larkin has composed two song cycles, Four Songs of Love and Loss and ‘wife in winter’, and directed their premiere performances. In May 2008, Mr. Larkin led the choir on its 5^th international tour directing the choir in Renaissance and contemporary repertoire in historic cathedrals in Venice, Florence and Rome. Mr. Larkin has been closely involved in the choir’s important New Discoveries Auditions for Young Artists programme, serving as Chair of the jury and as accompanist for the Winners’ Showcase Recitals. This season, he will make his debut appearance on the podium of the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra in Three Limericks for chorus, orchestra and mezzo-soprano by Canadian composer Harry Somers.

Matthew Larkin is well known both as an organist and choral conductor.  He received his early musical training as a chorister at St. George's Cathedral, Kingston, and was assistant organist there while in high school. He was Organ Scholar of Trinity College at the University of Toronto where he studied with John Tuttle, and later attended the Royal College of Music (UK), where he studied with Nicholas Danby.

A tireless advocate of boys' choirs, Mr. Larkin has served as Organist and Director of Music at the Church of St. John the Divine, Victoria, St. Matthew's Anglican Church, Ottawa and as Director of the Choir of Men and Boys at St James's Cathedral Toronto.  Since 2003, he has been Organist and Director of Music at Christ Church Cathedral Ottawa, whose Choir of Men and Boys was invited to be choir-in-residence at Ely Cathedral for a week, in July 2009.  Mr. Larkin was Director of the Anglican Chorale of Ottawa for ten years. He has appeared as organ recitalist throughout North America, the UK, and in Europe, has been featured on Canadian, American, and British public radio and has recorded extensively both as accompanist and director to some of Canada's finest church and concert choirs. Matthew Larkin has recently established Ontario's newest professional choral ensemble, the Larkin Singers.

Photo: Catherine Culley