THE new director of the Palestrina Chair in the Pro Cathedral, Dublin, is Dr Joseph Ryan, a former principal instructor and band conductor at the Army School of Music.
Dr Ryan was a member of the Palestrina Chair and has per farmed with a number of RTE choral ensembles. He has been a conductor of the chamber group, the Gaudete Singers, and far the past eight years had been conductor of the parish chair at the Church of the Sacred Heart, Donnybrook, Dublin.
He has written on music and presented a six part radio series, After Long Silence, which examined the achievements of Irish composers over the last two centuries.
He has taught at St Paul's secondary school, Greenhills. Dublin, and University College Dublin, where he also studied music. He did postgraduate studies in England and Germany.
He replaces Ms Ite O Donovan, who retired.