Melos Artistic Director Holly Gwynne-Timothy has been immersed in Early Music as a singer, choral conductor, and voice teacher for over 30 years in Ontario and in the USA. Holly split her undergraduate studies between voice performance at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and languages and musicology at the University of Toronto (Trinity College and the Faculty of Music). As a singer, Holly performed for nine years with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and Chamber Choir in Toronto, and did occasional chorus work for Opera Atelier. For seven years she was the soprano soloist with the quintet, Sine Nomine, at the Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies in the University of Toronto. In 2013, Holly moved to Kingston with her family, where, in addition to directing Melos Choir & Period Instruments, she teaches voice. She also works rehabilitatively with injured and compromised voices, using the functional methodology of Cornelius Reid, and serves actively in refugee sponsorship through St. George’s Cathedral. In Kingston Holly has taught at the Upper Canada Academy of Performing Arts, 2013-15, and at H’art School of Smiles 2014-17. Kingston Health Sciences employed Holly as vocal therapist, offering group vocal sessions for cancer patients from 2018 until the COVID pandemic started in March, 2020. She continues to work individually with cancer survivors and people with a variety of vocal injuries such as spasmodic dysphonia and vocal cord paralysis.

Since Holly became AD of Melos, the organization has expanded their concert narratives from mostly Baroque, to cover music from the Middle Ages through the Baroque eras; and from a focus only on Western Early Music to exploring a variety of Eastern traditions. Supported by Melos’ dynamic Board and membership, Holly has also steered Melos’ mandate to include abundant educational outreach in Early Music in Eastern Ontario. Since 2014 Melos has offered over 21 workshops and training with internationally renowned musicians to local amateurs and professional musicians. Melos has grown in its collaborations in performance with sectors of the community in Kingston that normally are not folded into Early Music performances, such as H’Art School of Smiles, Cancer patients and newcomers to Canada from the Middle East and Iran.

In 2016, under Holly’s leadership, Melos musicians began to explore Middle Eastern historic musics and European Early Music that evidences Eastern influences. These explorations led Holly/Melos to create programs collaboratively with Kingston musicians from Egypt, Iran, Syria and Armenia. Melos has now accomplished over 8 concert programs and three recordings which explore the rich history of East/West cultural and musical exchange. Melos has been awarded, through the success of these collaborations three grants from Heritage Canada as well as many other local artistic and communal grants (City of Kingston Arts Council; Community Foundation; Cataraqui Kingston Rotary Club, Bader IMAGINE series and more).  

In 2016 Holly was named a Paul Harris Fellow by the Rotary Foundation of Rotary International for “tangible and significant assistance given for the furtherance of better understanding and friendly relations among peoples of the world”. This award was a tribute to her communal outreach and initiatives, as well as to the impact of Melos and the collaborating organizations with which she has had the privilege of working.