Benjamin Thorburn

Benjamin Thorburn is a musicologist, singer, and conductor specializing in Baroque music. He received the B.A. in Music from the University of Rochester and the Ph.D. in Music History from Yale University. His research explores the revival and reception history of Baroque music as seen in twentieth-century adaptations and recompositions of Claudio Monteverdi’s operas. He has presented his work at regional and national conferences of the American Musicological Society, as well as internationally.

Dr. Thorburn joined the UCA faculty in 2023. He teaches upper-level and introductory courses across the range of music history for undergraduates and graduate students. Before coming to Arkansas, he served for seven years as Associate Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities at Chowan University, where he directed three choral ensembles and taught music history, applied voice, and conducting. He was named the 2022 recipient of the Choral Impact and Artistry award from the North Carolina chapter of the American Choral Directors Association for community engagement and contributions to diversity. Under his direction, choirs have given performance tours across North Carolina and Virginia and have traveled to perform at Carnegie Hall. From 2012 to 2016, Dr. Thorburn taught on the music faculty of Bluefield University in Virginia, where he directed the vocal program and taught in the Honors program. He studied choral conducting with L. Brett Scott at the University of Rochester.

As a singer, Dr. Thorburn is an experienced performer of art song, oratorio, and early music. He most recently appeared as a soloist in J. S. Bach’s Mass in B Minor at the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, Richmond, Virginia, with Three Notch’d Road Baroque ensemble. With his wife, harpist Colleen Potter Thorburn, he has presented song recitals throughout Virginia and the mid-Atlantic, and a recital at the 2017 national conference of the American Harp Society. Other performances have included Vaughan Williams’s Songs of Travel, Schumann’s Dichterliebe, and J. S. Bach’s solo cantata Ich habe genug. He has sung with the American Baroque Orchestra, Yale Baroque Opera Project, Yale Opera, and Eastman Opera Theatre, and in ensembles including the Virginia Chorale and Yale Schola Cantorum. He has studied historical performance at the Amherst Early Music Festival and the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute. His principal teachers in voice have been Lielle Berman, Ian Howell, and Jane Günter-McCoy.

Dr. Thorburn is a member of the American Musicological Society, the American Choral Directors Association, the College Music Society, Pi Kappa Lambda, and Phi Beta Kappa.