William A. Murphy, is a first-year doctoral student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in Vocal Coaching and Accompanying.  He was awarded a Teaching Assistantship with the Lyric Theatre @ Illinois. 

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He recently completed his seventh year as Staff Accompanist at Morehead State University.  He gave several performances with MSU faculty as a guest artist with performances at Berry College, Rome, GA, the University of Louisville and Marshall University in Huntington, WV.  On campus performances included many faculty and degree recitals and a World Premiere performance of Carter Pann's "Giantess" for Flute and Piano (2018). Additional performances have been heard at KMEA (2017), North American Saxophone Alliance (2018), Flute Society of Kentucky (2019 and 2023), ITF  (2019) and Falcone International Tuba Euphonium Festival (2021).  He can also be heard as a performer on the debut album "Bootleg" with bass trombonist Russ Zokaites (Centaur Records 2020).  Other artist collaborations include soprano Dr. Marlayna Maynard (Nashville), soprano Alexandra LoBianco (Chicago), clarinetist Rob Patterson (Boston), and several choral clinicians. 

 

Previous to his position at MSU, he was an adjunct faculty member at Marshall University starting in January 2013 that involved many roles of education and collaboration; including teaching private applied voice, theory and aural skills, class piano, directing the Choral Union, and pianist/coach for the Opera Workshop. 

Currently, he is the choirmaster at Emmanuel Memorial Episcopal Church in Champaign. For the previous thirteen years, he was the Organist at St. John's Episcopal Church in Huntington and in 2013, he received the Colleague Certificate from the American Guild of Organists.  In addition to this position, he was the pianist/organist for the West Virginia Symphony Chorus in Charleston for eight years, performing large choral works including Messiah (Handel), Ein Deutches Requiem (Brahms), The Ballad of William Sycamore (Stevens), and Weinachts-Oratorium (Bach) and most recently Requiem (Duruflé).  During the summer months, he has been employed for the WV Governor’s School for the Arts since 2021 working with the Vocal Arts students.  

He is a graduate of Marshall University (2012) with a Master of Arts in Performance (Piano).  He received a Bachelor's of Music in Voice Performance with Cum Laude honors from Morehead State University (2009).  He participated as a student and accompanist for the participants of the Kentucky Institute for International Studies (KIIS) program in Salzburg, Austria (Summers 2007 and 2009).  He is a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) and American Guild of Organists (AGO).