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The American choral conductor and organist, Peter DuBois, obtained his Bachelor of Music in Organ Performance from Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester (1976-1980), where he was a student of renowned artist-teacher David Craighead.. Hae obtained his Master of Music degree in Pipe Organ Performance at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1980-1982) , having studied there with Robert Glasgow. Former teachers also include David Mulbury, Clyde English and Marie Boette. He completed a month of study in Paris in January 2002 while on sabbatical, studying improvisation with Philippe Lefebvre, and repertoire with Marie-Claire Alain and Marie-Louise Langlais. He was 2nd place winner in the 1988 National Young Artists Competition in Organ Performance, sponsored by the American Guild of Organists (AGO), and 1st place winner in the 1987 Mid-Atlantic Regional Competition of the AGO.
In 1982, Peter Dubois joined the staff of the church as Director of Music & Organist at Christ Church United Methodist in Charleston, West Virginia and served in this position for 10 years. During this period, he also taught organ at West Virginia Wesleyan College and the University of Charleston. In 1985, in celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Holtkamp Organ, he started a program of “mini” recitals, which were held on the third Sunday of the month immediately after the 11:00 morning worship service. In 1986, the music ministry presented their first version of the Lessons and Carols Service patterned after the traditional service held on Christmas Eve in King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, England. In 1991, the congregation, led by the Worship & Arts Committee, presents their first Boar’s Head and Yule Log Festival.
Peter DuBois has served as Director of Music/Organist at Third Presbyterian Church in Rochester, New York since September 1991. He oversees a large and active music and arts ministry there. At Third Church, he serves as primary organist, coordinates the ministry of music and arts, serves as staff for the Worship, Music and Arts Committee, and directs the 60-voice Third Presbyterian Church Chancel Choir and Covenant Singers (youth choir). He has also produced and served as musical director for more than a dozen biennial youth musical productions, and he established and has served as artistic director of the biennial Boar’s Head and Yule Log Festival since 1994. From September 2000 to July 2014, and again in 2018-2019, he also served as Assistant Professor of Sacred Music (part time) and Director of the Sacred Music Diploma program at the Eastman School of Music.
In July 2009, in addition to his full-time duties at Third Church, Peter DuBois became host of the long-running public radio program, “With Heart and Voice,” a weekly program of sacred choral and organ music, produced by WXXI Public Broadcasting Council in Rochester, and syndicated nationally to over 125 stations in 36 states. In addition to stations around the country, the Rochester-based program can be heard live online on Sunday mornings 8-10am Eastern time, at www.wxxi.org/listen, and an archive of each week’s national program is available for on-demand listening online at www.withheartandvoice.org.
Critically acclaimed as a “world class talent,” Peter DuBois is in frequent demand as a recitalist around the USA and abroad. He has performed throughout much of the USA, and in Europe he has performed recitals in recent seasons at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London; the Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris (twice); the Basilica of Ste. Clotilde in Paris and the Cathédrale du Saint-Sauveur in Aix-enProvence. He has performed at regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists, and most recently at the Organ Historical Society National Convention in 2018. In addition, he has performed at the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina; at the Washington National Cathedral; Grace Cathedral, San Francisco; at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.; and in master-classes with Arthur Poister, Gillian Weir, Naji Hakim and Marie-Louise Langlais.
Peter Du Bois has performed both standard and contemporary organ concertos with several orchestras, including a performance of the Francis Poulenc's Concerto in G minor for Organ, Strings and Timpani with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, and performances of Stephen Paulus’ 1992 Concerto for Organ, Timpani, Percussion and Strings, Camille Saint-Saëns' Symphony No. 3 with Organ, and the F. Poulenc's Organ Concerto with the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra. He has led the Third Presbyterian Church Chancel Choir on two very successful international tours, beginning with a trip in 2001 that included spending a week as Choir-in-Residence at Rochester Cathedral (Kent, UK), and performing as well at Coventry and Salisbury Cathedrals. They returned to the UK in the summer of 2005 for a week as Choir-in-Residence at London’s landmark St. Paul’s Cathedral, as well as performing concerts in Ely and Edinburgh, and a private workshop with noted composer Andrew Carter. He made his New York City debut as a collaborative pianist, accompanying baritone Derrick Smith and trumpeter Herbert Smith in recital at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall in December 2006.
Peter DuBois is active not only as a recitalist and church musician, but as an organ clinician for various groups. He has presented workshops and masterclasses for numerous AGO chapters, and has been organ clinician for summer conferences of the National Fellowship of American Baptist Musicians in Green Lake, Wisconsin, and of the Northeastern Jurisdiction of the Fellowship of United Methodists in Worship, Music and the Other Arts. He participated as a presenter at the 15th AGO National Conference on Organ Pedagogy: Teaching Church Music in North America, held at Yale University (2009), and served as a judge for the final round of the Mu Phi Epsilon International Performance. He has been active in the American Guild of Organists, serving as General Chairman for the 1985 Mid-Atlantic Regional Convention held in Charleston, WV, and is a Past Dean of the Kanawha and Rochester chapters of the AGO.
Peter DuBois and his wife live in Rochester, and have two grown children. |
