His work included classical, choral, jazz, orchestral, operatic, and chamber music, most notably the opera entitled "Nitecap" which he composed in 1955.

[2] Cardon enrolled at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, and obtained a Bachelor of Music Education degree there in 1949.

While still a student, Burnham organized a male choral group called the "Chieftains" at Bradley; it originally comprised military veterans at the school, but its membership was soon broadened to include all interested male vocalists in the student body.

[5] He was the Chairperson in the Department of Music at Carroll from 1961 to 1974,[6] and he published several recordings with the Bowling Green State University Collegiate Chorale and A Capella Choir.

Burnham's best-known work was a chamber opera in one act, entitled "Nitecap," [8] which premiered in New Orleans in May 1956.

Cardon was Music Director of the Florentine Opera Company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the late 1970s;[10] he also directed "An Evening of Scenes from Grand Opera," "La Vie Parisienne," "The Incomplete Education," "Amahl & the Night Visitors," "L'Enfant Prodigue," "The Impresario," "The Poor Sailor," and "The Maid as Mistress.