John Finley Williamson (June 23, 1887 in Canton, Ohio – May 28, 1964 in

Toledo, Ohio Toledo ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lucas County, Ohio, United States. A major Midwestern United States port city, Toledo is the fourth-most populous city in the state of Ohio, after Columbus, Cleveland, and Cincinnati, and according ...

)''Biographical Dictionary of Modern American Educators''
/ref> was the founder of Westminster Choir and co-founder of

Westminster Choir College , mottoeng = Let us be judged by our deeds , established = 1926 , type = Private , president = Gregory G. Dell'Omo , dean = Marshall Onofrio , city = Dayton, OH (1926–1929), Ithaca, NY (1929–1932), Princeton, NJ (1932–2020), Lawrenc ...

. He is considered to be one of the most influential choral conductors of the twentieth century. He was described by

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

as the "dean of American choral directors." He was a 1925 initiate of the Alpha Theta chapter of

Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity of America (colloquially known as Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, Phi Mu Alpha, or simply Sinfonia) () is an American collegiate social fraternity for men with a special interest in music. The fraternity is open to men "w ...

fraternity, the national fraternity for men in music, at

Miami University Miami University (informally Miami of Ohio or simply Miami) is a public research university in Oxford, Ohio. The university was founded in 1809, making it the second-oldest university in Ohio (behind Ohio University, founded in 1804) and the ...

Westminster

In 1920 Williamson founded the Westminster Choir in 1920 at the Westminster Presbyterian Church of

Dayton, Ohio Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater D ...

. In 1926, he also founded the Westminster Choir School. In 1929 the School and the Choir moved to

Ithaca College Ithaca College is a private college in Ithaca, New York. It was founded by William Egbert in 1892 as a conservatory of music and is set against the backdrop of the city of Ithaca (which is separate from the town), Cayuga Lake, waterfalls, and go ...

Ithaca, New York Ithaca is a city in the Finger Lakes region of New York, United States. Situated on the southern shore of Cayuga Lake, Ithaca is the seat of Tompkins County and the largest community in the Ithaca metropolitan statistical area. It is named ...

State in 1929; in 1932 they moved to

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...

Williamson retired as President of the College in 1958; He died suddenly in 1964.

References

External links

The Daily Princetonian: Westminster Choir College
{{DEFAULTSORT:Williamson, John F 1887 births 1964 deaths American music educators American choral conductors American male conductors (music) Rider University faculty Classical musicians from Ohio 20th-century American conductors (music) 20th-century American male musicians