Music Director
Dr. Charles Tyler Turner
Dr. Charles Tyler Turner is a choral and orchestral conductor, classical and collaborative pianist, and music educator. He is Music Director of the Andover Choral Society, conducts the professional ensemble Cambridge Vocal Artists, and serves as Music Director for the Unitarian Universalist Society of Grafton and Upton.
Turner has led ensembles at Carnegie Hall, Symphony Hall in Boston, and Mechanics Hall in Worcester, and has appeared as guest conductor of combined forces at international festivals in Canada, the Czech Republic, and Bulgaria. He has toured with choral ensembles in Iceland, Ireland, and Austria, and has sung with the Oriana Consort and Voices21C on tours to Germany and Israel. As an educational ambassador, he completed a month-long teaching exchange in Shijiazhuang, China.
Turner has also held school, church, and community positions with the Boston Children's Chorus, Natick High School, Newton Country Day School, the Unitarian Universalist Society of Wellesley Hills, and St. Ignatius Parish at Boston College. He remains an active collaborative pianist for high school choral ensembles and musical theatre productions.
He has served on the board of the Massachusetts American Choral Directors Association, the conference planning committee for the Association of Unitarian Universalist Music Ministries, and as regional and All-State choral coordinator for the Massachusetts Music Educators Association, and has presented workshops, reading sessions, and papers at conferences for these and other national organizations.
Turner holds a bachelor's degree in music and educational studies from Rhodes College, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa; a master's degree in education from Harvard University; and a Doctor of Musical Arts from Boston University. His dissertation, Care in the Competitive Choral Ensemble, examines the attitudes and experiences of students and teachers preparing for an annual choral adjudication. He completed Kodály Levels I and II at Portland State University with Dr. Susan Brumfield.
Accompanist & Concert Pianist
Valerie Becker
Valerie Becker is a multi-faceted musician who is active as a pianist, conductor and music educator. She has served as pianist for the Andover Choral Society since the fall of 2014. Ms Becker has been a soloist with the Boston Pops and has appeared in recital with many major artists throughout the world. As a former rehearsal pianist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra she had the occasion to play for world-renowned artists such as Midori, James Galway, YoYo Ma, Kathleen Battle and Isaac Stern. She taught at the North Carolina School for the Arts has performed on both radio and television and has recorded on the ASV label.
Her work with developing voices includes serving on the Performing Arts Faculty of the Winsor School, serving as Music Director for the Needham Congregational Church, working with choral groups for 15 summers at Tanglewood, serving as pianist for the Metropolitan Opera regional auditions and as past conductor for Boston City Singers and Artistic Director for the Treble Chorus of New England, where she directed at any given point all levels of choirs. Ms. Becker has adjudicated Northeast District auditions, conducted the Northeast District Trebles in Concert, and has been a Choral Clinician for the Choristers Guild Southeastern Children’s Festival.
She is currently on the faculty of the New England Conservatory Prep School, the Rivers School Conservatory, and Needham High School. Ms. Becker also continues to perform as a freelance collaborative artist, teacher and conductor in the Boston area.
A native of Boston, Ms. Becker received both her Bachelor and Master of Music Degrees from Boston University, where she was also awarded membership into Pi Kappa Lambda, the national music honor society. Her post-graduate studies led her to the University of Illinois where she worked on an accompaniment and coaching degree, to Austria where she studied German Lieder, and to Italy where she performed with the Rome Festival Orchestra.