Voice Instrument: Tenor, Piano
Bio:

Shawn Kirchner is a composer/songwriter and singer/pianist whose choral works are sung throughout the world. His enduring creative relationship with LAMC Music Director Grant Gershon culminated in his appointment as the ensemble’s Swan Family Composer in Residence from 2012-2015. Kirchner has also collaborated with many leading choirs including Conspirare, Santa Fe Desert Chorale, San Antonio Chamber Choir, Lorelei Ensemble, Elektra Choir, Nairobi Chamber Choir, Vancouver Youth Choir, Princeton Chapel Choir, Atlanta Master Chorale, Tonality, and Coro Allegro. Kirchner’s choral works reflect his reverence for the inherited traditions of folksongs, carols, and hymns, and incorporate the rhythmic vitality, counterpoint, and improvisatory spirit of Baroque and bluegrass traditions. His original songwriting ranges in style from jazz/gospel to folk/bluegrass, the latter featured on his album Meet Me on the Mountain.

Kirchner has sung in the LA Master Chorale for 24 seasons, with such career highlights as LAMC’s Duke Ellington Sacred Service concerts with the Luckman Jazz Orchestra and a special post-encore LA Phil chamber music concert with pianist Andras Schiff and a double octet of LAMC singers. He sang on LAMC’s recordings of Adams, Reich, Glass, Lang, Gorecki, and Muhly, and has been featured as a soloist on works of Perotin, Pärt, Ramirez, and Meredith Monk. Kirchner also sang countertenor from 2016-2023 in the touring ensemble for LAMC’s ground-breaking, fully-staged Lagrime di San Pietro, directed by Peter Sellars. He has also sung on four dozen feature film soundtracks, including Avatar, Frozen, La La Land, and the X-Men series.

Kirchner’s improvisation at the piano has fueled his creativity since childhood, and his unique style, often featured in his choral works, synthesizes his classical background with the folk/bluegrass influence of his music mentor, Steve Kinzie. Kirchner was raised with his triplet siblings in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Growing up in the Midwest in the Church of the Brethren (an historic peace church) has shaped his life-long focus on issues of peace and justice, gardening, and earth-friendly ways.

He is the 2026 recipient of the Blackwell Prize in Music, and in 2024 his music was featured in UC Irvine Chamber Singer’s winning recording for the American Prize Ernst Bacon Award for performance of American Music. His settings of Pablo Neruda, first commissioned by the LA Master Chorale, were featured in Conspirare’s 2016 Grammy-nominated album, Pablo Neruda: The Poet Sings. www.ShawnKirchner.com