4.15.2005

For Public Release

The Glee Club is pleased to announce that University of Michigan alumnus Paul Rardin has been appointed Men's Glee Club Director beginning in the fall. He will also serve as Associate Director of Choirs in the School of Music where he will conduct the University Choir and teach graduate and undergraduate courses in conducting.

Rardin currently serves as professor and director of choral activities at Towson University in Towson, Maryland, where he directs the University Chorale, Vocal Jazz Ensemble, Choral Society, and New Music Ensemble. He is also Eastern Division Repertoire & Standards Chairperson for College/University Choirs for the American Choral Directors Association. Rardin’s choruses have earned regional and national acclaim, and have performed in such venues as Boston Symphony Hall, Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, Washington National Cathedral, Duke University Chapel, The Cathedral of St. Philip (Atlanta, GA), Riverside Church (New York, NY), and Immaculate Conception (San Diego, CA). The Towson University Chorale performed with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in 2002 and 2004.

A graduate of Williams College, Rardin also studied at the University of Michigan, where he received the M.M. in composition and the D.M.A. in conducting. He has studied conducting with Theodore Morrison, Jerry Blackstone, Gustav Meier, and composition with Leslie Bassett, George Wilson, and Robert Suderburg. He has also participated in master classes with Helmuth Rilling, Charles Bruffy, and Dale Warland. Since joining the Towson University faculty in 1993, Rardin has served as guest conductor for state and regional high school choral festivals in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Oregon. He has presented clinics for the American Choral Directors Association (MD/VA), Pennsylvania Music Educators Association, Virginia Music Educators Association, and numerous county and city school systems in Maryland.

Rardin is also a published arranger, composer, and author. His settings of the Jamaican folk songs Hol’ You Han’ and Back to Ethiopia were premiered in 1996 at the ACDA Central Division Convention in Cincinnati by the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club and were subsequently published by Santa Barbara Music Publishing. Walk in Jerusalem, also published by SBMP, has been performed by two ACDA all-region high school choirs, five all-state high school choirs, and the Hong Kong Youth Music Camp Choir and is featured on the Glee Club's CD Songs of Youth. Other titles with SBMP include the spirituals Some of These Days, the original Telemarketing Blues, and I’m A-Rollin’ which was commissioned by the Club and premiered in November 2002. The Towson University Chorale premiered Noise, a “percussively vocal romp for four-part chorus,” in November 1997. His articles, many on the topic of contemporary music, have appeared in the ACDA publications Choral Journal, Troubadour, and Bel Canto.

Rardin currently lives in Baltimore with his wife, Sandy.

Contact: Adrian Leskiw, Alumni Relations

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