Alexander T. (Thom) Cringan was a teacher, administrator, conductor and ethnomusicologist. After early training in Carluke he attended John Spencer Curwen's Tonic Sol-Fa College in London (licentiate 1886) and studied voice with Emil Behnke. He visited Toronto about 1885 and settled there in 1886, teaching school music and becoming music director for city schools. He was music director 1901-31 at the Toronto Normal School and in 1919 was appointed inspector of the teaching of music for Ontario. He also taught tonic sol-fa at the Toronto College of Music and voice at the TCM ca 1900-20. He was the first president of the music section of the Ontario Educational Association (OMEA) 1919-22. He was choirmaster at Central Presbyterian Church 1887-95 and Cooke's Presbyterian Church 1897-1900, a member 1900-11 of the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, and often the organizer of massed choirs of school children for such public events as the opening in 1894 of Massey Music Hall (Massey Hall). His manual The Canadian Music Course (Toronto 1888) was the official music text of the Toronto Board of Education. Other books by Cringan include Teacher's Handbook of the Tonic Sol-Fa System.