My Story

Tenor Christopher MacRae has been praised for his musicality and dramatic portrayals, and for possessing “a beautiful and sonorous tenor voice!” He made his professional debut with Calgary Opera, performing the role of Dr. Blind in Die Fledermaus, and has since appeared across Canada and the US with companies like Opera on the Avalon, Toronto Summer Music Festival,and The Banff Centre among others. As a proponent of contemporary works, selected highlights of his stage credits include Sir Philip in Owen Wingrave, the Male Chorus in The Rape of Lucretia, McAlpine in Filumena (Estacio), The Governor & Vanderdendur in Candide, Pirelli in Sweeney Todd, The Tenor in Six Characters in Search of an Author (Weisgall), Sheldon in Later the Same Evening (Musto), and created the roles of Seth as a Man in John Beckwith’s historical opera Taptoo!, and The Doctor in Lorena Orozco’s English adaptation of The Waiting Room. In concert he has appeared as the title characters in Lohengrin with Toronto’s Opera By Request, and Werther with Calgary Concert Opera Company.

He has been frequently engaged as a concert soloist in works such as Orff’s Carmina Burana, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Choral Fantasy, Mozart’s Requiem and Mass in C Minor, Verdi’s Requiem, Handel’s Messiah and Theodora, MacMillian’s Celtic Mass of the Sea, Britten’s St. Nicola Cantata, Elgar’s The Kingdom, Bach’s Magnificat and Christmas Oratorio, and Rachmaninoff’s Vespers.

Dr. MacRae is a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) and is a past president of the Arkansas Chapter. He has presented at the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences Congress in Calgary, the International Symposium on Singing and Song in St. John’s Newfoundland, and the NATS Southern Region Conference and Student Auditions. He has been a master class clinician or guest lecturer at John Brown University, Delta State College, and Mount Royal College, and has adjudicated music festivals across Western Canada including the Calgary Performing Arts Festival, Battlefords Kiwanis Music Festival, Winnipeg Music Festival, Brandon Festival of the Arts, Brandon, Lloydminster Music Festival, Weyburn Music Festival, and the Canada West Classes at the Saskatchewan Provincial Music Festival.

He received a Doctor of Musical Arts in Vocal Performance from Boston University, and holds additional degrees in music from McGill University and the University of Calgary. He formerly was a Lecturer in Voice at the University of Regina, and was a Teaching Assistant Professor, Vocal Area Coordinator and Director of Graduate Studies at the University of Arkansas, where he received the ‘Outstanding Mentor Award’ three times. He has worked with a wide variety of students who have gone on to win numerous auditions and competitions, and are pursuing a variety of careers in music.