Tim Sharp is Executive Director of the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), the national professional association for choral conductors, educators, scholars, students, and choral music industry representatives in the United States. Sharp, an active choral conductor and researcher/writer, has varied his career with executive positions in both higher education and publishing and recording.

 

Dr. Sharp's research and writing focuses pedagogically in conducting and score analysis as evidenced by his publications Precision Conducting, Achieving Choral Blend and Balance, and Up Front! Becoming the Complete Choral Conductor. Published essays betray his eclectic interest in acoustics, architecture, creativity, and aesthetics. He is also published in the area of eighteenth and nineteenth century American music, with scholarly articles and books including The German Songbook in the Nineteenth Century, and popular histories including Memphis Music Before the Blues and Nashville Music Before Country. His most recent publications include a short history of the American Choral Directors Association (Arcadia 2009), the co-edited Festschrift Jubilate! Amen!  in honor of Donald Paul Hustad (Pendragon 2010), and Mentoring in the Musical Arts: Helping Others Find their Voice (GIA Publications, 2011). He is currently completing work on the Johannes Herbst collection Hymns to be Sung at the Pianoforte, which will be the first work published in Steglein Publishing's new series, Musical Treasures from Moravian Archives.

 

Tim has conducted university, church, community, and children’s choirs, conducted ACDA and MENC all-state and honor choirs, and formed choirs in such unlikely settings as a federal penitentiary and a chamber of commerce meeting. His choirs have toured domestically and abroad, singing in some of the world’s premiere concert and acoustic settings including St. Mark’s Cathedral in Venice, Washington, D.C.’s National Cathedral, St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, and New York's Carnegie Hall. In the summer of 2011, Sharp was the principal guest conductor for the Festival of the Aegean in Syros, Greece.

 

Sharp holds the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in conducting from the School of Church Music of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky. He is a Clare Hall Life Fellow at Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK, has studied at the Aspen School of Music, the Harvard NEH Medieval Sacred Music Studies program, and received a Rotary Fellowship for study in Belgium. He came to ACDA from Rhodes College, Memphis, TN, where he was Dean of Fine Arts, conductor of the Rhodes Singers and MasterSingers Chorale, and held the Elizabeth G. Daughdrill Chair in the Fine Arts. Before his appointment at Rhodes, he was Director of Choral Activities at Belmont University, Nashville, TN, where he conducted the Belmont Chorale and Oratorio Chorus.

 

Dr. Sharp has served ACDA in many capacities, including membership on the Choral Journal Editorial Board, as editor for the Choral Journal standing column “Hallelujah!”; as member of the Research and Publications Committee; and as a state Repertoire and Standards chair and Interest Session and Reading Session presenter at ACDA Division and National Conferences. He represents ACDA on the Leadership Board of the International Federation for Choral Music (IFCM). In 2009, Tim became the Conductor and Artistic Director of the Tulsa Oratorio Chorus, Tulsa, OK.