Tom Council graduated from Southern Methodist University with a BM and MM in Music Education. He began teaching in the Dallas ISD in 1965. He taught High School choir in Dallas and Mesquite Texas until 1995. During these thirty years of teaching, he was active in Texas Music Educators Association, Texas Choral Directors Association and American Choral Directors Association. He served as Southwest Chair for the ACDA Jazz and Show Choir Committee. His high school choirs have presented concerts at National ACDA (1977) and TMEA (1983) conventions. In 1993, the St. Stephen Choir performed at the Denver ACDA convention with two other Dallas church choirs with Lloyd Pfautsch conducting a concert of his music. Always an active arranger and composer for school and church, he has published works with Alliance Music, Colla Voce, GIA, Hal Leonard, Excelcia, Concordia Publishing House and Carl Fischer. He has written music for The Texas Voices, Turtle Creek Chorale, Booker T. Washington High School, “Kantorei” of the Concordia Theological Seminary, the High School Choirs of the Mesquite ISD. The Chamber Choir of North Mesquite, the Mesquite Children’s Chorus. and the North Mesquite High School Men’s Choir. In April 2009, his “We Are the Music Makers” was premiered as part of the opening programs for the new Dallas Center for the Performing Arts in the Meyerson Symphony Center. He has been writing choral sight reading music for Texas choral contests since 1990. After he retired, he taught composition and vocal classes for several years at Booker T. Washington High School for the performing and Visual Arts in Dallas. He was director of music at St. Stephen UMC in Mesquite, (Dallas County) Texas for 34 years and served four other churches in the Dallas area as music director.
