A native of Cheyenne, Wyoming, Dr. Ryan Garrison is a recently appointed Director of Choral and Vocal Music at the Denver School of the Arts. Garrison comes to Colorado by way of San Antonio, Texas, where he was the Artistic Director of the Children’s Chorus of San Antonio. Prior to his full-time artistic appointment, Dr. Garrison maintained an active 13-year schedule as a professional choral singer, conductor, and educator in Phoenix, Arizona.
From 2005-2013, Garrison was a singing member of the GRAMMY-award winning professional choral ensemble, The Phoenix Chorale, under the artistic vision of renowned conductor, Charles Bruffy. With the ensemble, Garrison is credited on four albums garnering six GRAMMY nominations and two GRAMMY wins, including “Best Choral Performance” in 2016.
In 2013, Garrison joined the choral artistic staff at Arizona School for the Arts (ASA) in central Phoenix, a school acknowledged as a national model for exemplary education gained through intense emphasis on studies in the performing arts. From 2014-2017, as the school’s lead director and contact for the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), Dr. Garrison had over 90 students selected for the Western Regional and National-level Honor Choirs, traveling to Salt Lake City, Utah (2015), Pasadena, California (2016), and Minneapolis, Minnesota (2017). He has worked as guest clinician and conductor, leading regional and state-level Honor Choirs and Orchestras in Texas, Arizona, Colorado, and Wyoming, and looks forward to conducting the ACDA Wyoming All-State Children’s Choir in June 2020.
Dr. Garrison received both his Doctor of Musical Arts in Choral Conducting (DMA, 2013) and Masters of Music Education (MM, 2006) degrees from Arizona State University, and Bachelors of Music (BM, 2001) from the University of Wyoming.
