Greetings, and thank you for visiting my site.

I’m Lucas Harris, a Toronto-based lutenist and conductor.

I spend my professional life mostly as a freelance performer on historical plucked instruments (lutes and early guitars) as both a soloist and a basso continuo accompanist. 

I’m also a choral conductor and have been the Artistic Director of the Toronto Chamber Choir since 2014.

My other professional activities include teaching, lecturing, coaching vocalists & instrumentalists, musical research, music engraving, as well as audio & video editing.

Much of my work falls within my specialty of Renaissance & Baroque repertoire, though I do make forays into many other kinds of music. I’ve conducted music from the Medieval to the Contemporary periods. As a guitarist I extend out to the Classical & Romantic periods (on my 1831 Guadagnini guitar) and also work on projects related to popular songs, folk music, and even jazz, most notably with the Vesuvius Ensemble.

Bio

Lucas Harris began his musical life playing equal amounts of jazz and classical guitar as a teen in his hometown of Phoenix, Arizona.  He discovered the lute during his undergraduate studies at Pomona College, where he graduated summa cum laude.  He then studied early music in Italy at the Civica scuola di musica di Milano (as a scholar of the Marco Fodella Foundation), then in Germany at the Hochschule für Künste Bremen.  After several years in New York City, Lucas moved to Toronto in 2004, becoming a Canadian citizen in 2017.  In Toronto he has been the regular lutenist for the Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra for more than two decades, and performs with many other ensembles in the USA and Canada including the Smithsonian Chamber Players and the Helicon Foundation (see the “Playing” page for more details).  He is also a founding member of the Toronto Continuo Collective, the Vesuvius Ensemble. and the Lute Legends Ensemble.

In 2014 Lucas completed graduate studies in choral conducting at the University of Toronto, the degree having been largely funded by a prestigious Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council grant not often awarded to performers.  Upon graduating, Lucas was chosen as the Artistic Director of the Toronto Chamber Choir (which celebrated its 50th anniversary season in 2018-2019), for which he has developed and conducted over twenty themed concert programs (see this site’s “Conducting” page for a list).  He has also directed projects for the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, the Ohio State University Opera Program, Les voix baroques, and the Toronto Consort.

For many years Lucas has been on faculty at the Tafelmusik Summer and Winter Baroque Institutes as well Oberlin Conservatory’s Baroque Performance Institute and has also taught for Vancouver Early Music’s Baroque Vocal Programme, the International Baroque Institute at Longy, and Amherst Early Music.  Lucas was praised for his work with Les voix humaines in Montréal: “The revelation of the concert was the Torontonian lutenist Lucas Harris, who weaved a poetic thread through his infinitely subtle interventions.  The sweetness and patience of his playing . . . was astonishing.”  (Le Devoir)

Lucas lives in Toronto with his wife, Baroque violinist Geneviève Gilardeau, and their daughter Daphnée (age 9).

Teachers

 I would like pay homage to these plucked instrument teachers I’ve been fortunate enough to work with:

• Chris Hnottavange – electric & classical guitar studies in Tempe, AZ from 1986-1992

• Jack Sanders – classical guitar studies at Pomona College from 1992-1996

• Paul Beier – lute studies at the Civica Scuola di Musica di Milano from 1996-1997

• Stephen Stubbs – lute/continuo studies at the Hochshule für Künste Bremen from 1997-1998

• Andrew Lawrence King – continuo studies at the Hochshule für Künste Bremen from 1997-1998

• Patrick O’Brien – sporadic lute lessons in New York City from 1998 until his untimely death in 2014