Jerrad Fenske received his Bachelor of Arts in Church Music from Gustavus Adolphus College, in Saint Peter, Minnesota, his Master of Music in Vocal Performance and Accompanying from The San Francisco Conservatory of Music in California and his Master of Liturgical Arts from Saint John’s University School of Theology Seminary, Collegeville, Minnesota. Completing the German for Singers program at Middlebury College in Vermont, he also spent time working toward his Doctorate of Music in Vocal Performance and Literature at the Indiana University Jacobs’ School of Music where he studied voice and operatic role preparation with Martina Arroyo and voice with Giorgio Tozzi and James McDonald. He was mentored by the late Metropolitan Soprano, Audrey Stottler in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
As a singer, he concentrated his efforts on the dramatic Italian and German Romantic period, singing works of Leoncavallo, Puccini, Wagner and Strauss. As a conductor, his focus in church choral music has played a concentrated role in his almost 40 years of church work. He also developed the choral and voice programs at Cardinal Stritch University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
In his work as an organist and harpsichordist, the focus has been in the Northern Germanic School performing works of Bach, Handel, the generations of Praetorius and Buxtehude. He has served churches and choral organizations in Minnesota, California, Arizona, Indiana, New York, Wisconsin, Illinois and South Carolina.
Jerrad maintains a music studio in Anderson, South Carolina while continuing his performing, mentoring and his clinician work with musicians of all ages.