Christopher Bell has served as Chorus Director of the Grant Park Chorus since 2002. Bell oversees a chorus of more than 100 singers, along with the Project Inclusion Vocal Fellows, a unique program designed to encourage singers under-represented in the field. Bell prepares all of the Festival’s choral programs, and conducts the orchestra and chorus for several concerts.

During his tenure, he and the chorus have been recipients of the coveted Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence given by Chorus America, as well as glowing reviews from both critics and audiences alike. In 2013, Bell won the Michael Korn Founders Award for Development of the Professional Choral Art.

In a career spanning thirty years thus far, Christopher has been chorusmaster of the Edinburgh Royal Choral Union (1987–1990), Chorus Master of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra Chorus (1989–2002) the Belfast Philharmonic Choir (2005–2011) the Edinburgh Festival Chorus (2007–2018) and the Washington Chorus (2017–2020).

Largely responsible for the formation of the National Youth Choir of Scotland (NYCOS) in 1996, he has been its Artistic Director ever since. The National Youth Choir of Scotland has toured to Sweden, Ireland, Chicago, Hungary, Germany and Central Europe, has won a prestigious Royal Philharmonic Society Award, and performed at the BBC Proms and the Edinburgh International Festival to great acclaim. NYCOS organisation has expanded to has expanded over 25 years to include fifteen regional choirs, three national choirs and an extensive education and publishing arm.

Bell was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Music from the Royal Conservatoire in Scotland in 2012, in recognition of his contribution to performing arts in Scotland. In 2015, he was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Music from the University of Aberdeen.

Born in Belfast, Bell was educated at Edinburgh University and held his first post as Associate Conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony. Since then, he has worked with many of the major orchestras in the UK and Ireland, including the Royal Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Royal Scottish National, BBC Scottish Symphony, Ulster Orchestra, Scottish Chamber, City of London Sinfonia, London Concert, RTE National Symphony, RTE Concert and the Bournemouth Symphony. Between 2009 and 2017 he was Associate Conductor of the Ulster Orchestra. Recent orchestral performances have included San Francisco Symphony and the Orchestra of Opera North.

He is well-known for his work with young musicians. Before his current post with the National Youth Choir of Scotland, he was the founding conductor of the Ulster Youth Choir, director of the Total Aberdeen Youth Choir for six years, and director of the prestigious RSNO Junior Chorus for twenty four years. 

The Grant Park Orchestra was formed in 1944 when the Chicago Park District assembled a single resident orchestra under the direction of Principal Conductor Nikolai Malko to perform at the Grant Park Music Festival (which began in 1935 and featured a series of visiting orchestras). Since then, other prestigious conductors have held the position, including Irwin Hoffman, Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, Zdnek Macal and Hugh Wolff. In 2000, Carlos Kalmar was named the Festival’s Principal Conductor.

Today, the Grant Park Orchestra draws its musicians from different orchestras and musical institutions throughout the United States. Each summer, all of the orchestra members gather in Millennium Park for a ten-week long season consisting of intensive rehearsals and performances. During the year, the musicians can be found across the country performing with major orchestras, teaching at numerous universities and appearing frequently in concert stages across the country. Some organizations represented by Grant Park Orchestra musicians include the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Metropolitan Opera, the Buffalo, Colorado, Jacksonville, Kansas City, Milwaukee, New Mexico, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Richmond, San Antonio, Seattle, and Utah Symphonies. The Grant Park Orchestra was nominated for a Grammy award for its recording entitled Robert Kurka: Symphonic Works.

Now celebrating its 60th anniversary season, the 80+ member Grant Park Chorus was formed in 1962 by Thomas Peck, who led the group until his death in 1994. His protégé, Michael Cullen, then led the chorus until 1997, after which a series of guest conductors worked with the ensemble until 2002 when an international search identified current chorus director, Christopher Bell. 

Winners of the 2006 Margaret Hillis Award for artistic excellence, the Grant Park Chorus is a fully professional ensemble and the majority of the vocalists reside in Illinois. In addition to frequent solo appearances and teaching careers, members of the Grant Park Chorus perform with ensembles such as Chicago a cappella, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the Chicago Symphony Chorus. 

Everything about Holst’s most familiar music is quintessentially British, perfectly evoking rolling green hills, games of cricket in the sunshine and jam scones. Perhaps slightly ironic then, that Holst’s original name was Gustavus Theodor von Holst and he was born into a family of Latvian-Russian origin. Regardless of this fact, Holst’s work has remained incredibly popular as 'patriotic music' in Britain, with the use of the famous 'I vow to thee my country' from Jupiter perhaps being the most obvious example.

While some of Holst’s music was obscure in its experimentation with Indian harmonies and rhythms, the absolute polar opposite was The Planets, which was the classical equivalent of a smash hit with the public, and has become a staple in orchestral programming and classical 'best of' collections. The brilliance of the instrumental writing, inspired by Debussy, Ravel and Stravinsky, cannot be denied, and this has helped The Planets to travel internationally more than many other British orchestral works of the period. From the brooding, chilling evocation of war in Mars (written just before the outbreak of World War I), to the barnstorming jollity of Jupiter and the mysterious smoke of Saturn and Neptune, these are musical paintings of the highest order.

Although not of the same high profile as the astronomical orchestral suite, other works by Holst such as Egdon Heath and A Somerset Rhapsody contain orchestral writing of a similar level of virtuosity, and show a love of folksong shared with his contemporary Ralph Vaughan Williams. Holst’s blending of traditional melodies, European modernism and Eastern influences, provided an imaginative range of styles for future generations of composers, as diverse as Benjamin Britten, William Walton and Malcolm Arnold.

Source: Boosey & Hawkes

Lili Boulanger (Marie-Juliette Olga Lili Boulanger, 21 August 1893–15 March 1918) was a French composer, the younger sister of the noted composer and composition teacher Nadia Boulanger.

A child prodigy, Boulanger's talent was apparent even at the age of two, spotted by her parents, both of whom were musicians themselves and encouraged their daughter's musical education. (Her mother, Raissa Myshetskaya (Mischetzky), was a Russian princess, who married her Paris Conservatoire teacher, Ernest Boulanger; grandfather Frédéric Boulanger had been a noted cellist, and grandmother Juliette a singer.) Boulanger accompanied the ten-year-old Nadia to classes at the Paris Conservatoire before she was five, shortly thereafter sitting in on classes on music theory and studying organ with Louis Vierne; she also sang and played piano, violin, cello, and harp. In 1913, at the age of 19, she won the Prix de Rome for her Faust et Hélène, becoming the first woman composer to win the prize; Nadia had given up entering after four unsuccessful attempts and had focused her efforts upon guiding her sister.

Lili, first a student of Nadia and then of Paul Vidal, Georges Caussade, and Gabriel Fauré —the last of which who was greatly impressed by the young woman's talents and frequently brought songs for her to read— was greatly affected by the 1899 death of her father; many of her works touch on themes of grief and loss. Her work was noted for its colorful harmony and instrumentation and skillful text setting; aspects of Fauré and Claude Debussy can be seen in her compositions, and Arthur Honegger was one composer influenced by her innovative work. Jazz pianist Herbie Hancockhas said she is one of his favorite composers.

Her life and work were troubled by the chronic illness, beginning with a case of bronchial pneumonia at age two that weakened her immune system, leading to the intestinal tuberculosis (now called Crohn's Disease) that cut short her life at age 24. Though she loved travel, completing several works in Italy after winning the Prix de Rome, her failing health forced her to return home, where she and Nadia organized efforts to support French soldiers in World War I. Her last years were also a productive time musically as she labored to complete works previously left unfinished. Boulanger was buried in Paris, in the Cimetière de Montmartre, leaving unfinished the opera La princesse Maleine on which she spent most of the last years of her life. The definitive biography is The Life and Works of Lili Boulanger (ISBN 0-8386-1796-4) by the American musicologist Léonie Rosenstiel.

The asteroid 1181 Lilith was named in her honour.

Source: last.fm.com

Jake Runestad is an award-winning composer and conductor who believes in the power of music for positive change. Jake’s “highly imaginative” (Baltimore Sun) and “stirring and uplifting” (Miami Herald) musical works have been featured in thousands of performances worldwide and have earned a 2022 EMMY® Award for Musical Composition and 2020 and 2025 GRAMMY® Award nominations. Having collaborated with leading ensembles and organizations around the globe, Jake has a versatile and prolific career creating works for orchestra, wind band, chorus, chamber ensembles, and opera. His visceral music and charismatic personality have fostered a busy schedule of commissions, residencies, workshops, and speaking engagements, establishing him as “one of the best of the younger American composers” (Chicago Tribune). 

Steeped in a belief that music has the power to initiate positive change, Jake creates musical works that are socially conscious and explore authentic human emotions and experiences. The Minneapolis Star Tribune noted that Jake has “…a particular knack for marrying powerful music to texts that speak to some of the most pressing and moving issues of our time.” Recent projects explore themes such as suicide awareness and prevention, immigration, gender equality, disabilities, loss, and the climate crisis — all presented through a widely-researched, inclusive, artistic, and imaginative lens. In a desire to make an impact beyond the music itself, Jake uses a portion of the proceeds from his music sales to donate to non-profit organizations connected with the themes of his works including: the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the NAACP Empowerment Programs, the Clean Air Task Force, and Ka Joog (a Minnesota-based nonprofit that enriches the lives of Somali-American youth through education, mentoring, employment, and the arts). 

Conductors, performers, and audiences continue to praise his music for its originality and expressivity, and its ability to connect with the head and the heart. As a result, Jake was one of the youngest composers ever awarded the coveted Raymond W. Brock Commission from the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) in 2018 — the foremost commission available to composers of choral music in the USA. For this honor, Jake wrote the ground-breaking, dramatic choral work A Silence Haunts Me which conducting legend Dale Warland hailed “a masterpiece.” Considered a “choral rockstar” by American Public Media, Runestad has also received a 2020 Outstanding Graduate Award from Johns Hopkins University, a 2017 McKnight Fellowship, a 2016 Morton Gould Young Composer Award from the ASCAP Foundation, as well as awards from the American Composers Forum, ASCAP, the Peabody Conservatory, New Music USA, VocalEssence, the Virginia Arts Festival, the National Association for Music Education. 

The first full album dedicated to Jake’s choral music, “The Hope of Loving,” was released in 2019 by Craig Hella Johnson and Conspirare and subsequently received a GRAMMY® Award nomination. Jake’s monumental choral symphony Earth Symphony garnered a 2022 EMMY® Award for Musical Composition and is being performed by choirs and orchestras around the globe. A Dream So Bright: Choral Music of Jake Runestad, recorded by True Concord Voices & Orchestra, received a 2025 GRAMMY® nomination. In his relatively short career, Jake has already worked with leading ensembles such as VOCES8, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, the Munich Radio Orchestra, the Swedish Radio Symphony, the Bavarian Radio Choir, the National Chorus of Korea, Seraphic Fire, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra & Chorus, the Phoenix Chorale, the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, Pro Coro Canada, the Taipei Philharmonic Choir, the Netherlands Radio Choir, the Philippine Madrigal Singers, and many more. Jake’s music is often featured at national and regional conferences of the American Choral Director’s Association (ACDA), Chorus America, Podium (Canada), and the Association of British Choral Directors. Reaching audiences around the world, his compositions have been heard in thousands of performances from Taiwan to Finland to Argentina to Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, Los Angeles’ Disney Hall, the Sydney Opera House, and New York City’s Carnegie Hall. 

In-demand as a guest conductor, Jake Runestad has collaborated with student, community, and professional ensembles around the world. His dynamic presence on the podium, focus on building community, and attention to expressivity and meaning engage performers and audiences in compelling musical experiences. Recent and upcoming engagements include New York City’s famed Carnegie Hall, Los Angeles’ Disney Hall, St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, the Sydney Opera House, as well as residencies with ensembles and institutions across six continents. 

A rising star in the national opera scene, Jake was commissioned by Washington National Opera for his third opera, Daughters of the Bloody Duke — a collaboration with award-winning librettist David Johnston. Daughters of the Bloody Duke had its premiere performance at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. and was met with rave reviews from critics including Anne Midgette of the Washington Post. One of the few comedy operas written in recent years, this new work was “as much fun for the singers as it was for the audience” (Washington Post). 

Jake Runestad holds a Master’s degree in composition from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University where he studied with Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Kevin Puts, in addition to formative mentoring from acclaimed composer Libby Larsen. Originally from Rockford, IL, Jake is currently based in Minneapolis, MN. For more information and to purchase scores, please visit JakeRunestad.com