Rhodes Singers

The Rhodes Singers are a noted undergraduate choir from Rhodes College in Memphis, TN, specializing in smaller, unaccompanied chamber music works. They are directed by Dr. William Skoog.

The Rhodes Singers were established in 1937 as the concert choir for the College by music professor and composer Burnet C. Tuthill, who joined the college faculty in 1935. Tuthill, son of the architect of New York’s Carnegie Hall, was a clarinetist who also founded the group that was to become the Memphis Symphony Orchestra. Professor Tuthill established the tradition of the annual choir tour throughout the United States; in 1976, his successor, Professor Tony Lee Garner ’65, led the inaugural international concert tour, bringing sacred music and southern spirituals to Romania in conjunction with Friendship Ambassadors. Professor Garner also created the MasterSingers Chorale in the early 1990s, bringing together alumni and community singers.