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Christopher Gray has been Director of Music at St John’s College since April 2023. With responsibilities focusing on the College’s celebrated Choir and organ, he works with the Choristers, Choral Scholars, Choral Graduates, and Organ Scholars to provide music that enhances the liturgy of the Chapel, upholding a tradition that dates from the 1670s.
After early musical education in his hometown of Bangor, Northern Ireland, Christopher became Assistant Organist at St George’s Parish Church, Belfast. At the age of 18 he moved to England to take up the organ scholarship at Pembroke College, Cambridge, where he read Music. A Fellow of the Royal College of Organists, Christopher studied the organ with David Sanger and Nicolas Kynaston at Cambridge. He was subsequently taught by Margaret Phillips at the Royal College of Music, where he was a postgraduate student and a prize-winner. During this time, he also held the organ scholarship at Guildford Cathedral.
In 2000 Christopher was appointed Assistant Director of Music at Truro Cathedral, working closely with Andrew Nethsingha and then Robert Sharpe. In 2008 he became Director of Music, taking on responsibility for the cathedral choir and its seven sung services each week, as well as the Father Willis organ. As Musical Director of Three Spires Singers and Orchestra he conducted most of the large-scale choral-orchestral repertoire.
During his time at St John’s, Christopher has directed the Choir in venues including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Philharmonie in Luxembourg, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Müpa in Budapest, as well as leading collaborations with the Academy of Ancient Music and The Gesualdo Six.
He has continued the St John’s tradition of commissioning new works and is adding to the Choir’s distinguished recording catalogue of one hundred albums.
