Organist and Choirmaster Elizabeth Anderson is no stranger to St. Thomas’s, having arrived as a chorister under former director John Tuttle in 1989, holding various positions ever since, including Organ Scholar (1992), Assistant Organist, and Associate Organist, as well as Interim Organist and Choirmaster twice (July 2016 to September 2017 and August 2022 to February 2023). She was officially appointed Organist and Choirmaster in March 2023.
Elizabeth has sung professionally with Soundstreams’ Choir 21, the Elora Festival Singers, and the Exultate Chamber Singers; has been a vocal coach for the Choral Scholars of Trinity College, Toronto; and frequently collaborates as conductor or accompanist with the Toronto Chamber Choir. She studied organ with John McIntosh and conducting with Deral Johnson at the University of Western Ontario, and later studied organ with John Tuttle at the University of Toronto, graduating with a Bachelor of Music degree in Organ Performance.
While at the University of Toronto, she held the posts of Organ Scholar of Trinity College and Assistant Organist at the Church of St. Mary Magdalene. Elizabeth happily shared conducting and playing responsibilities with John Tuttle both at home and abroad. St. Thomas’s choirs made three successful tours to the UK, where they sang in residence at York Minster and Gloucester Cathedral (2005), Salisbury Cathedral and St. Paul’s Cathedral, London (2010); and Canterbury Cathedral, St. George’s Chapel, Windsor, and Westminster Abbey (2013).
“It is a great privilege to serve in this capacity, and I am grateful to Father Humphrey, the Wardens, the choirs, and the parishioners who care so deeply for excellence in liturgical music.”
Acting Assistant Director of Music Philip J. Fillion was most recently Cathedral Organist at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Michael, Toronto. He accompanied the choirs of St. Michael’s Choir School at three sung Masses each weekend, in concert, and on annual national and international tours. He performed for the 2023 joint convention of the RCCO and the Organ Historical Society, and assisted in implementing the Cathedral’s concert series. He is also part of the music team at Royal St. George’s College, Toronto, where he accompanies the choirs and trains the organ scholars. Before he moved to Toronto in 2022, he was Assistant Director of Music and Organist at Saint Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church, Dallas, one of the largest congregations in the Episcopal Church. There he accompanied the church’s four choirs, trained the boy and girl choristers, played for services, and assisted in the administration of the music program, producing the music theory curriculum now in use at St. Thomas's Church. From 2017 to 2020, he was Organist and Director of Music at St. Mary’s Church in Auburn, NY, where he directed the Choir and Schola Gregoriana, trained high school students in Gregorian chant, and accompanied the four weekend masses on the recently restored 1890 Barckhoff and 1872 House organs. Philip has also served as organist at the Cathedral Basilica of Ss. Peter and Paul in Philadelphia, Grace Church in Newark, NJ, and as choral accompanist at Elmhurst College in Chicago. He has given world premieres of works by Philip Moore, Cecilia McDowall, Angela Kraft Cross, and Todd Wilson, and accompanied choirs in tours of Canada, the United States, and Europe. Philip earned his master’s degree in sacred music and organ at Westminster Choir College, where he studied organ with Daryl Robinson, and his bachelor's degree in organ from Wheaton College, Illinois, where his advocacy for LGBTQ rights on campus was cited by TIME Magazine. Philip lives in Greektown with his wife, Melody, and their two daughters.
“What Elizabeth is doing with the High Mass and Evensong choirs is spine-tinglingly good, and playing for such a choirmaster is a rare, rare treat. With four new members joining the children’s choir in the past weeks, the future for our St. Thomas’s Choristers is so bright, and I look forward to leading them as they grow as singers! ”