Biography

Baltimore-native Grant Cochran received his undergraduate education at Trinity College (CT), graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music and History, with honors in Music. His graduate study was completed at the Yale University School of Music, where he held a number of conducting positions including Director of the Yale Freshman Chorus. As valedictorian of his Master of Music class, he went on to earn the Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in choral conducting.

While at Yale, Dr. Cochran studied conducting under Marguerite Brooks and Fenno Heath. He received further training from Robert Shaw, Sir David Willcocks and from Helmuth Rilling as a master-class conductor at the Oregon Bach Festival, where he directed both the Festival Choir and Orchestra and the Kyoto Bach Choir from Japan. Selected as a conducting fellow at the Chorus America/Chicago Symphony Association Conducting Workshop, he led the Civic Orchestra of Chicago and members of the Chicago Symphony Chorus under the tutelage of Stephen Cleobury, Fiora Contino and Gustav Meier.

Studies in composition, orchestration and arranging were taken with Maury Yeston, Willie Ruff, Gerald Moshell, and Fenno Heath. Dr. Cochran's choral and orchestral arrangements are published with the E. C. Schirmer Music Company and Morningstar Music Publishers.

Dr. Cochran has served as an adjunct professor on the faculties of Alaska Pacific University and the University of Alaska Anchorage. In 2011, he became the first to hold the full-time choral-faculty position at UAA where he is now Professor of Music and Chair of the music department. Dr. Cochran teaching duties include Voice Methods, Music Appreciation, Popular Songwriting, History of Jazz, and conducting the University Singers. 

In addition to his work at UAA, Dr. Cochran is the artistic director and conductor of the Anchorage Concert Chorus. During his tenure, the Concert Chorus has collaborated with all the major arts organization in Anchorage as well as with various orchestras from both the “lower 48” and abroad, including the National Symphony (USA), the Academy of Oxford Orchestra (England), the Moscow and St. Petersburg State Philharmonic Orchestras (Russia), the Karlovy Vary Symphonic Orchestra (Czech Republic) and the Orchestra Filarmonica dei Navigli (Italy). The Chorus also has had the privilege of sharing the stage with a range of “celebrity” artists that have included Jerome Hines, Judy Collins, the Pointer Sisters and the Chieftains.

He made his Carnegie Hall conducting debut in June of 2022 where he conducted members of the Anchorage Concert Chorus and the New England Symphonic Ensemble in a performance of Dan Forrest’s “Jubilate Deo.”

He has extensive experience at the secondary level as well, holding teaching positions at public and private schools in Alaska and Connecticut, including Grace Christian School, Dimond and Service High Schools (AK) along with St. Mary’s High School and The Canterbury School (CT). Over the course of his thirty-year professional life, Dr. Cochran has appeared as music director, accompanist, adjudicator, singer and actor for various opera, theatre, choral and church organizations throughout the United States.

His professional work in Anchorage is nicely complemented by a busy home life that includes his wife, Lorna, and their children: Hailey and Stephanie, Madison, Drew, and August.