Ryan Lee Turner assumed the position of Music Director of the Newburyport Choral Society in June, 2020.

Widely regarded as a passionate, expressive and powerful vocal and orchestral conductor, Ryan Turner is also an accomplished tenor soloist and music educator.  A resident of Haverhill, he is also the artistic director of Emmanuel Music in Boston, and is on the voice and early music faculty at the Longy School of Music of Bard College in Cambridge.

Assiduously fluent in the music of Bach, Turner has conducted over 170 Bach cantatas and the complete masterworks of Bach: the St. John Passion, St. Matthew Passion, his own reconstruction of the St. Mark Passion, Mass in B Minor and Christmas Oratorio, and the complete Orchestral Suites. In addition, he has led major works by Stravinsky, Mozart, Handel, and John Harbison. A champion of new music, Ryan Turner has programmed and premiered the works of composers John Harbison, Matthew Aucoin, James Primosch, Brett Johnson, and Ben Houge.

As an opera conductor, Turner recently led acclaimed performances with the Boston Lyric Opera of Frank Martin’s Le Vin Herbé and Philip Glass’ In the Penal Colony.

Turner was the Director of Choral Activities at Phillips Exeter Academy from 2006 to 2012. From 2001 to 2010 Mr. Turner presided as Music Director of the Concord Chorale and Chamber Orchestra. He has also served as Assistant Director of Choral Activities at the University of Rhode Island, as Interim Director of Choral Activities at Plymouth State University, and as Music Director of the Concord Chorus.

Raised in El Paso, Texas, Turner holds degrees from Southern Methodist University in Dallas and The Boston Conservatory. Ryan Turner lives north of Boston with his wife, soprano Susan Consoli, and their two children, Aidan and Caroline.

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