Choral Music by

Music Career Summary

Nearly 200 of Crawford R. Thoburn's choral compositions, arrangements, and editions have been published by more than a dozen different firms. Choirs across North America and throughout the world sing his music, with performances noted in England, Germany, Austria, Canada, France, South Africa, Japan, India, and Taiwan. Professional, church, and college groups record his works, which have been broadcast on National Public Radio and Public Radio International.

Crawford is Professor of Music, emeritus, at Wells College in Aurora NY where he served for decades as Director of Choral Activities and taught voice, conducting, theory, composition and music history. His choral ensembles at Wells won international awards in juried competition, performed by invitation at ACDA  and MENC conventions, toured in the U.S. and Europe, performed with many other groups and sang with professional orchestras. He conducted numerous inter-collegiate choral collaborations, and earned a national reputation for expertise in women's choral literature and performance. 

He earned a B.A. from Allegheny College, where he studied theory, arranging, and conducting with Morten J. Luvaas. In 1999, the Allegheny Alumni Association selected Crawford to receive its prestigious Gold Citation, "in recognition and appreciation of the honor reflected upon the college by virtue of his professional achievements."

At Boston University, he received an M.M. and worked as an assistant to his instructor in voice and conducting, Allen C. Lannom.  Crawford later studied choral and orchestral conducting with Otto-Werner Mueller, Margaret Hillis, and Robert Shaw. While on a year-long sabbatical leave, he was a member of (and soloist with) the renowned St. Martin Singers of London, England, under the direction of W. D. Kennedy-Bell.

Crawford served on the first National Committee on Editorial Standards of the American Choral Directors Association. His scholarly articles have appeared in the American Choral Review, the Wells College Express and the Choral Journal, where he headed the Choral Review Department for five years. 

While at Wells, he chaired the Music Department, the Division of the Arts, the Centennial Committee, the New Arts Facilities Committee, and the Summer College Program.  His colleagues  repeatedly elected him to the Faculty Advisory Committee, and the administration named him the first Campbell Professor of the Arts. 

Crawford served for many years conducting church choirs for Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterian and Episcopalian congregations, frequently in collaboration with his wife, organist Karen A. Hindenlang