 |
Warren Ottey, Music Director, is in his fourteenth season as the conductor of the Syracuse Chorale. He is a native of Coatesville, PA, and began his study of voice at West Chester State University after winning first place of all high school baritones in the Southeastern District Chorus auditions. After graduation he entered Eastman School of Music as a recipient of a University of Rochester National Scholarship and private student of Metropolitan Opera Mezzo Soprano Anna Kaskas. |
His further studies took him to Chicago's Moody Bible Institute where he was a soloist and vice-president of the famed Moody Chorale. He later attended Eastern University and pitched on the varsity baseball team. His voice teachers and coaches have included Elizabeth Westmoreland of Philadelphia's Curtis Institute of Music, Charles Wagner Opera baritone Frank Cappelli , New York City Opera's Donald Hassard, and Natchez Opera Festival director, David Blackburn.
For many years Mr. Ottey was a well-known professional church soloist and oratorio baritone on Philadelphia's Main Line, where he also began to do choral conducting. He established vocal teaching studios in Suburban Philadelphia and in Reading, PA, where he was the chief founder of Berks Grand Opera, which he served as president, director-at-large, and leading baritone.
Upon his 1988 arrival in Syracuse, Mr. Ottey was called upon by Syracuse Opera, with two weeks' notice, to sing La Traviata's Baron Douphol, one of over twenty opera roles he has performed on stage. For the succeeding four years he was heard as an evening radio announcer and host on Syracuse's FM dial and as soloist in many area church concerts.
An experienced minister of music, Mr. Ottey is presently director of music and organist at Cazenovia Village Baptist Church and director for more than fourteen years of "The Master's Touch Chorale," a Greater Syracuse interdenominational Christian choir, who were privileged to sing two December concerts at the White House in 2002 and 2004. Mr. Ottey maintains a vocal teaching studio in his home in the Hamlet of Oran, where he resides with his wife, Cherolyn.
