Jon Washburn

Jon Washburn is the conductor and artistic director of Canada's Vancouver Chamber Choir and travels widely as guest conductor, lecturer, clinician, and master teacher. He earned a choral conducting degree at the University of Illinois and proceeded to pursue musicological studies at Northwestern and the University of British Columbia. Washburn quickly became involved in Baroque and Renaissance music as a busy professional viola da gamba and violone player. He was one of the founders of the Vancouver Society for Early Music (now Early Music Vancouver) and a long-time member of its management committee. He has led over 300 performances of more than 80 large works by a range of composers. 

He also served as artistic director for six years for the Phoenix Bach Choir and associated with several amateur ensembles, including Vancouver's Bach Choir and Willan Choir, Victoria's Amity Singers, and the early Jon Washburn Singers. He has commissioned and premiered nearly 200 new works by Canadian, American, and European composers during his career. Washburn has received the Friends of Canadian Music Award from the Canadian League of Composers and the Canadian Music Centre. As an active composer, arranger, and editor, he has had many compositions published, performed, and recorded around the world. 

In 2001 Washburn was named a Member of the Order of Canada (the nation's highest civilian honor) and in 2002 received Queen Elizabeth's Golden Jubilee Medal for his lifetime contribution to Canadian choral art. He received a Distinguished Service Award from the Association of Canadian Choral Conductors in 1996 and the Louis Botto Award from Chorus America in 2000. In the fall of 2009, he was named a CMC Ambassador and in 2010 received a star on the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame's Starwalk. In 2012 Washburn received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal.