Matthew Larkin, Music Director of the Ottawa Choral Society, 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.

Mr. Larkin has served as Organist and Director of Music at the Church of St. John the Divine, Victoria from 1988-95, St. Matthew's Anglican Church, and Ottawa from 1995-2002, and as Director of the Choir of Men and Boys at St James's Cathedral Toronto, for the 2002-2003 seasons.  Since 2003, he has been Organist and Director of Music at Christ Church Cathedral Ottawa.  A tireless advocate of boys' choirs, he continues to work to promote that tradition in the Anglican Church of Canada. Mr. Larkin was the Founding Director of Ottawa’s Euphonia Chamber Choir and was Director of the Anglican Chorale of Ottawa for ten years.

Matthew Larkin has appeared as organ recitalist throughout North America, the UK, and in Europe, and has been featured on Canadian, American, and British public radio.  He has recorded extensively both as accompanist and director to some of Canada's finest church and concert choirs. Psalms for the Spirit and Hear My Prayer, on which he appears as guest artist with Noel Edison and the Choir of St. John's, Elora, were released on the Naxos label in 2006 to wide critical acclaim. As a composer, Mr. Larkin receives frequent commissions and has contributed numerous liturgical works to the choral repertoire. For the Ottawa Choral Society, he has written two secular song cycles, Four Songs of Love and Loss, premièred in his debut season with the choir in 2005 and wife in winter, which received its première performance on April 21^st, 2007 at St. Joseph’s Church, Sandy Hill, Ottawa, Canada with the composer conducting.

Matthew Larkin's personal website is located at www.matthewlarkin.ca

SCOTT RICHARDSON

Accompanist

Scott Richardson is active in Ottawa as a freelance accompanist specializing in choral accompaniment and in the flute repertoire.  He grew up in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and went on to study music at Mount Allison University.  His graduate studies took him in a different direction, however, and he later completed a Ph.D. in English literature at the University of Ottawa.

He is currently the accompanist for both the Ottawa Choral Society and the Canadian Centennial Choir, and has also accompanied the Ottawa Children's Choir.  Scott also maintains a busy schedule of private teaching, and was for many years a music history instructor with the Ottawa Youth Orchestra Academy.  As an organist and choir director, he has held various positions in the Atlantic Provinces and in Ottawa - the most recent being that of Music Director at Orleans United Church.