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1. Short biography
Andrew Shenton is a scholar, prize-winning author, performer, and educator based in Boston, Massachusetts. Born in England, he first studied at The Royal College of Music in London, and holds bachelor, masters and doctoral degrees from London University, Yale, and Harvard respectively.
In addition to diplomas in both piano and organ Dr. Shenton holds the Choir Training diploma of the Royal College of Organists. He has toured extensively in Europe and the US as a conductor, recitalist, and clinician, and his three solo organ recordings have received international acclaim. He has been the recipient of numerous scholarships and awards including a Harvard Merit Fellowship, Harvard’s Certificate of Distinction in Teaching, and a Junior Fellowship from the Humanities Center at Boston University.
He has given more than eighty premieres by composers such as Geoffrey Burgon, Joe Utterback, John Tavener, Judith Weir, and Arvo Pärt. Moving freely between musicology and ethnomusicology Shenton’s work is best subsumed under the heading ‘music and transcendence,’ and includes several major publications on Messiaen, Pärt, and others. His most recent monograph, Arvo Pärt’s Resonant Texts was published by CUP in 2018.
Dr. Shenton is Professor of Music at Boston University, and Conductor of Vox Futura. [198 words]
2. Long biography
Andrew Shenton is a scholar, prize-winning author, performer, and educator based in Boston, Massachusetts. Born in England, his first professional music training was at The Royal College of Music in London, where he studied under a scholarship from The Royal College of Organists. While at the RCM he read for a BMus degree at London University and was an organ scholar at St. Paul’s Cathedral.
Andrew Shenton moved to the US to study for a Master’s degree at the Institute for Sacred Music, Worship and the Arts at Yale University and then for a PhD in musicology at Harvard University.
Dr. Shenton has a Master’s degree in organ performance from Yale, and holds the Fellowship diploma of the Royal College of Organists. He has given recitals in such venues as King’s College, Cambridge; Westminster Abbey; St. Paul’s Cathedral, London; St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue; and Washington National Cathedral. He has toured extensively in Europe and the US as a conductor, recitalist, and clinician, and his three solo organ recordings have received international acclaim.
In addition to diplomas in both piano and organ Dr. Shenton holds the Choir Training diploma of the Royal College of Organists. He has been the recipient of numerous scholarships and awards including a Harvard Merit Fellowship, Harvard’s Certificate of Distinction in Teaching and a Junior Fellowship from the Humanities Center at Boston University. He has given more than eighty premieres by composers such as Geoffrey Burgon, Joe Utterback, John Tavener, Judith Weir, and Arvo Pärt.
Moving freely between musicology and ethnomusicology Shenton’s work is best subsumed under the heading ‘music and transcendence.’ This is demonstrated by his recent and ongoing work in popular music, which includes an essay that analyses the acoustic ecology of rave music as a way of negotiating an ecstatic experience (Fordham University Press, 2014), and lectures and writing on how hip-hop has become a complex soundscape that signals religious identity. A subsidiary to this work is his interest in how sound studies deal with issues of cognition, and the physical and mental elements of transformation and transcendence. His pioneering work on Olivier Messiaen includes a monograph Olivier Messiaen’s System of Signs (Ashgate, 2008), which won the 2010 Miller Book Award; and a collection of essays which he edited entitled Messiaen the Theologian (Ashgate, 2010). More recently his work on Arvo Pärt includes several lectures and recitals, and publications such as The Cambridge Companion to Arvo Pärt (CUP, 2012), which he edited. His most recent monograph, Arvo Pärt’s Resonant Texts was published by CUP in 2018.
Dr. Shenton is conductor of the professional chamber choir Vox Futura. At Boston University, Dr. Shenton holds appointments in the School of Theology, School of Music (College of Fine Arts), and College of Arts and Sciences. He is a Professor of Music, the James R. Houghton Scholar of Sacred Music, Director of the Sacred Music program, the Boston University Messiaen Project [BUMP], and the Theology and Arts Initiative [TAI]. [492 words]