Jeffrey Douma
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Jeffrey Douma (pronounced /daʊmə/) is the Director of the Yale Glee Club and an Assistant Professor of Choral Music at the Yale School of Music. Prior to his appointment at Yale in the fall of 2003, he taught at Carroll College, where he was Director of Choral Activities, and also served on the conducting faculties of Smith College and St. Cloud State University.
Choirs under his direction have appeared in Leipzig's Neue Gewandhaus, Prague's Dvorak Hall, the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, Sydney Town Hall, Christchurch Cathedral, Avery Fisher Hall, and Carnegie Hall, and he has prepared choruses for such conductors as Sir David Willcocks, Anton Nanut, Constantine Orbelian, Shinik Hahm, Krzysztof Penderecki, and Sir Neville Marriner. An advocate of new music, he recently established the new Yale Glee Club Emerging Composers Competition and has premiered new works with the Glee Club by such composers as Lee Hoiby and Dominick Argento.
Active as a clinician and guest conductor with musicians at all levels, he is also a member of the conducting faculty at the Interlochen National Arts Camp, America's premier training ground for high school age musicians, and is currently the American Choral Directors Association's Repertoire and Standards Chair for College and University Choirs in the state of Connecticut. From 1998-2000, he served as Chorusmaster and guest conductor of the Windsor Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Ontario. He recently appeared as conductor the Yale Alumni Chorus on its first ever tour to South America.
An active singer, Douma has appeared as an ensemble member and frequent tenor soloist with many of the nation's leading professional choirs, including the Dale Warland Singers, Bella Voce of Chicago, the Arcadia Players, the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus under Helmuth Rilling, and the Robert Shaw Festival Singers under the late maestro Robert Shaw.
In the spring of 2003, Douma was one of only two American conductors invited to compete for the first Eric Ericson Award, a new international competition for choral conductors, advancing to the semifinal round in October 2003, and appearing in Uppsala and Stockholm as conductor with four of Sweden's leading choirs.
Jeffrey Douma earned a Bachelor of Music Degree from Concordia College, nationally renowned for its choral music program. He holds both Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees in Choral Conducting from the University of Michigan. At both Concordia and Michigan he held choral conducting assignments.
