Murray Walker, Music Director, Fine Arts Division Head

B.Mus., University of British Columbia
MA (Music), California State University, Long Beach

A native of Vancouver, Canada, Murray Walker holds music degrees from the University of British Columbia and California State University, Long Beach. He was born singing Anglican church music and has sung with the choirs of Christ Church Cathedral, Vancouver, Christ Church Cathedral, Montreal, the former St. Paul’s Cathedral, Los Angeles, Trinity Cathedral, San Jose, and Norwich Cathedral, England. He has also sung professionally with the Vancouver Chamber Choir and the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus. In the early 1990’s he conducted the Santa Cruz Youth Symphony. He presently directs a cathedral-style music program at Calvary Episcopal Church, Santa Cruz.

He established the York School Music Department in 1986, starting with an orchestra of 7 students and a choir of 11. At the end of the first year the program had more than tripled in size and Murray received the school’s first Outstanding Faculty Award. The music program now boasts two choirs, a concert band, an orchestra , a jazz band and an early music consort. About 40% of the student population participates in the music program. The groups give several performances each year at the school and in the community.

Murray has served as the vice-president of the California Orchestra Directors Association and on the board of the Central Coast Section of the California Association for Music Education. Additionally, he holds memberships in the American Choral Directors Association, the California Band Directors Association and the National School Orchestra Association.

In addition to his music teaching duties at York, Murray is the Head of the Fine Arts Division, coordinates the School’s forum program and, in the absence of a resident chaplain, is the School’s sacrist.