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McKern, Cory 211x278

Corey McKern

  • Position:  Interim Director of the Dr. Grier Williams School of Music and Instructor of Voice
  • Department: Dr. Grier Williams School of Music
  • Office Location: Building 82, Room 212
  • cmckern@uwf.edu
  • Campus: 850.474.6297

Biography

Corey McKern is the interim director of the Dr. Grier Williams School of Music and instructor of voice. McKern teaches applied voice, voice studio, and other classes in music and theater departments.

McKern, a baritone, has garnered critical acclaim in more than 40 roles on the opera and concert stage. Since making his stage debut in 2000, he has performed with opera companies across the U.S. and overseas.

In the 2015 through 2016 season, he was a soloist in Handel’s “Messiah” with the Phoenix Symphony, in Beethoven's “Symphony no. 9” with the Seattle Symphony, and returned to Carnegie Hall in Beethoven’s “Mass in C” with the New York Choral Society. He will return to the Pensacola Opera as Danilo in Lehár's “The Merry Widow” and Nashville Opera, and Florentine Opera as Eisenstein in “Die Fledermaus.”

He made his international debut as Marcello in “La Bohème” with Opera Hong Kong, a role he also sang with the Santa Fe Opera, Opera Birmingham, Nashville Opera, Augusta Opera, the Florentine Opera and Opera Grand Rapids. An active singer on the concert stage, he made his debut at Carnegie Hall in Faure’s “Requiem” and returned to the prestigious concert hall for John Rutter’s “Mass of the Children” and Mozart’s “Requiem.”

A grant recipient from the Sullivan Foundation, he also won first place in Opera Birmingham, Shreveport Opera and Mobile Opera competitions. In 2011, McKern received the Alumnus of the Year award for the Mississippi State University music department and the college of education.

Degrees & Institutions

He received a Bachelor of Music Education with voice emphasis from Mississippi University and Master of Music in voice performance from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. He is also a graduate of the Seattle Opera Young Artist Program.

Keywords: baritone, applied voice, Carnegie Hall