Berkley E. Chadwick

Berkley E. Chadwick. Choir conductor, b Saint John, NB, 19 Nov 1880, d Hudson, near Montreal, 1964. He spent most of his life in Montreal and for several years was choirmaster at Erskine and American United Church. At the request of the United Church of Canada the choir there recorded hymns in the Umbundu dialect for use by missionaries in Angola. Chadwick became director of the Apollo Glee Club in 1921 and served 1923-51 as conductor of the Montreal Elgar Choir, the product of a merger of the all-male Apollo Glee Club and the Elgar Women's Choir. During the 1930s he taught music at Lower Canada College and Trafalgar School. For 14 years he conducted the School for Crippled Children's choir and rhythm band, leading both to many honours at the Quebec Music Festivals. For many years Chadwick was the chorus master for works conducted at the MSO and the Montreal Festivals by Sir Thomas Beecham, Emil Cooper, Sir Ernest MacMillan, Bernard Naylor, Eugene Ormandy, Wilfrid Pelletier, and Lazar Weiner. He retired in 1951, and settled in Hudson, but was organist-choirmaster of St James' Anglican Church there until his death.