Canadian Music Centre - Prairie Region - Composer Database

Allan Gordon Bell was born in Calgary in 1953. He received a Master of Music degree from the University of Alberta where he studied with Violet Archer, Malcolm Forsyth, and Manus Sasonkin. He also did advanced studies in composition at the Banff Centre for the Arts where his teachers were Jean Coulthard, Bruce Mather, and Oskar Morawetz.

Allan Bevan was born in Toronto, and did his undergraduate studies in music at the University of Windsor, and at Queen’s University in Kingston. His composition teachers and mentors include Istvan Anhalt, Howard Bashaw, Allan Bell, Clifford Crawley, David Eagle, Malcolm Forsyth, Paul McIntyre, and William Jordan. Mr. Bevan holds the M. Mus. degree from the University of Alberta and a Ph. D. in Composition from the University of Calgary.

Carmen Braden lives in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories and works as a composer, performer, and field recordist. All her musical creations are influenced by the sonic environment, both natural and man made, and she uses original texts in many works. Braden’s works reflect her connection to the contemporary classical world as well as her experience as a jazz pianist, and singer-songwriter.

QUENTEN DOOLITTLE, born in Elmira, New York in 1925, taught as a Professor of Music at the University of Calgary, from 1960. He took early retirement in June, 1988. A naturalized Canadian citizen, he holds degrees from Ithaca College, Indiana University and the Eastman School of Music.

His formal training in composition was with John Weinzweig; however, a lifetime of musical atmospheres and practical experience performing on the violin and viola and conducting were influential. His American childhood was full of the sounds of a large middle class family in which he was the fifth child of seven: temperance hymns, family sing-songs of popular sheet music, jazz from a brother musician, arrangements of operatic arias for beginning violin in school class lessons, drum solos in the attic from another brother, tap dance rhythms from a younger sister and piano player rolls -- a teeming household of sounds and noises.

David Eagle composes chamber, orchestral and electroacoustic music, and in recent years, has explored computer applications in composition, improvisation, multimedia and sound spatialization. His latest kinetic music compositions use the movement of sound to fundamentally transform the listening experience. An Associate Professor at the University of Calgary, he teaches composition and electroacoustic music and is Director of the Electroacoustic Music Studio and the New Music Ensemble.

George Fenwick is a free-lance composer and arts administrator. A native Calgarian, he studied composition with Allan Bell and Quenten Doolittle, and received his B.Mus from the University of Calgary.
He has written works for the concert hall and the stage which have been performed throughout Canada, in France, Germany and the USA, and broadcast on CBC Radio. He has also participated in several multidisciplinary projects.

Canadian Composer Kristin Flores began studying composition at the University of Alberta in 1998. In 2001 she obtained a Bachelor of Music Degree in music composition and theory from the University of Alberta and in 2004 graduated with a Master of Music degree in composition from the University of Alberta. In 2010 she graduated from the University of Calgary with a PH.D in music composition, under the supervision of Allan Bell. She has studied composition with Malcolm Forsyth, Laurie Radford, Howard Bashaw, Paul Steenhuisen, William Jordan, David Eagle and Allan Bell.

Paul Zicheng Fu graduated from the Central Conservatory of Music in China in 1952. Soon afterwards, he became assistant professor of piano, theory and composition at the Studio of Music in Qing Hua University in Beijing, holding this post from 1954-1978. In 1978 he began teaching at the Music Department of the Beijing Teacher's College in China, where Fu was associate professor of Theory and Composition until 1988. In 1991, Fu worked in Calgary as a substitute piano teacher and accompanist for ballet classes at Mount Royal College. From 1991-1994 he studied at the University of Calgary, where he obtained a Master's Degree in Music Composition.

Sonya Guha-Thakurta holds both Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees in composition from the University of Calgary, where she studied with Allan Gordon Bell, David Eagle and William Jordan. While still a student, she was the recipient of a Godfrey Ridout Award in the SOCAN Young Composers Competition, and won first prize in the 2000 Land’s End Composers Competition. In 2006 she was a nominee for the Emerging Artist Award at the Mayor’s Luncheon for Business and the Arts.

Lesley composes acoustic and electroacoustic music, and her works have been performed and workshopped across Canada, the US, and Italy by various ensembles including the Arditti String Quartet, Sound Icon, Land’s End Chamber Ensemble, Ensemble Resonance, Ensemble contemporain de Montréal, L’Orchestre de la Francophonie, Ensemble l’Arsenale, Strata Ensemble, the Violet Collective, and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Lesley earned her Doctorate in Composition at Boston University studying under Joshua Fineberg, and is the co-founder of the Boston-based Acoustic Uproar concert series. She currently lives in Calgary, AB.

Vincent Chee-Yung Ho (b. 1975, Ottawa, Ontario). Canadian composer, currently residing in both Canada and the USA, of mostly orchestral, chamber and piano works that have been successfully performed in both North America and abroad.
Mr. Ho began composing at the age of fourteen. After receiving his ARCT in Piano Performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music in 1993, he studied composition with Allan Gordon Bell, David Eagle and William Jordan at the University of Calgary from 1994-98, earning BMus. He then completed his MMus at the University of Toronto in 1998, where he studied with Walter Buczynski and Christos Hatzis. He recently earned his DMA from the University of Southern California while under the supervision of Stephen Hartke.

RICHARD JOHNSTON was born in Chicago. His earliest musical influence was Ruth Crazier-Curtis, a teacher at a junior high school but also, and more importantly, a composer that was to introduce the young Johnston to other fellow composers and to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The next step in Johnston's education came in the form of a scholarship, through Sven Lekberg, to Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois. Another teacher and one of his greatest influences, Nadia Boulanger, came to lecture in Chicago with the result that, for two summers, Johnston studied intensively with Mlle. Boulanger. She directed his attention to the great composers of Poland. His love for folk-life studies led to a warm association with Zoltán Kodály, who also coloured his life in many ways.

William Jordan was born in Athens, Georgia in 1951. He received a PhD degree in Music Theory from Florida State University in 1976, after completing a MA in Composition at the University of Pennsylvania and a BMus in Composition from the University of Georgia. His teachers included Nadia Boulanger, George Crumb, George Rochberg, and Krysztoph Penderecki.

GREGORY LEVIN (b. 1943) came to prominence as a composer in the early 1970s, his reputation growing steadily since then with works performed in concerts and broadcasts throughout Canada and internationally. Besides being a composer, Dr. Levin is also a performer, conductor, and teacher, serving on the faculty of the University of Calgary, where he established himselfafter early studies and career activity in the United States. Among those whom he has studied composition are Luciano Berio and Pierre Boulez. Dr. Levin's body of work includes songs, cantatas, and operas, many involving multi-media compositions, in which mode he has drawn on his diverse musical interests to integrate disparate and seemingly incompatible elements.

Shelley Marwood is an emerging composer currently based out of Toronto, Ontario. She has had works performed across Canada and in the U.S., by ensembles such as the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Windsor Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble Contemporain de Montréal, Rubbing Stone Ensemble, and the UCalgary String Quartet. Recent commissions include works for Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (Olympic Commissioning Project 2010), Windsor Symphony Orchestra (Windsor Canadian Music Festival 2009), New Works Calgary (Happening Festival 2009), and the Cincinnati Youth Wind Ensemble in 2011.

Playful and witty, passionate and tuneful, rhythmic, tender and moving - all describe the music of David Leroy McIntyre. Since the 1970s he has created an impressive body of concert, pedagogical, and church music that continues to be received enthusiastically by performers and audiences alike. Whether music for solo piano or organ, voice or chorus, chamber ensemble or full orchestra, it is a music that stirs deep emotion, hope and zest for life.

With music described as “breathtaking” (Kitchener-Waterloo Record), “imaginative and expressive” (The National Post), “a pulse-pounding barrage on the senses” (The Globe and Mail), and “Bartok on steroids” (Birmingham News), Kelly-Marie Murphy’s voice is well known on the Canadian music scene. She has created a number of memorable works for some of Canada’s leading performers and ensembles, including the Toronto, Winnipeg, and Vancouver Symphony Orchestras, The Gryphon Trio, James Campbell, Shauna Rolston, the Cecilia and Afiara String Quartets, and Judy Loman.

Dubbed "especially glorious... ethereal" by Whole Note, and "a highlight of the concert" by the Boston Musical Intelligencer, the music of Canadian composer Tawnie Olson has been performed by a wide range of ensembles and individual musicians, including the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, the Gemini Duo, Duo Fiolûtröniq, the Satie Quartet, the Land's End Ensemble, the Canadian Chamber Choir, the Guelph Chamber Choir, the Yale Camerata and Yale Pro Musica, bassoonist Nadina Mackie Jackson, and harpsichordist Katelyn Clark. She has won awards from the SOCAN foundation and the Guelph Chamber Choir/Musica Viva, and is a two-time semifinalist in the Sorel Foundation competition.

Composer Laurie Radford creates music for diverse combinations of instruments and voices, electroacoustic music, and for performers in interaction with live computer-controlled signal processing of audio and video. His music has been performed and broadcast throughout North and South America, Europe and Asia. He has received commissions and performances from ensembles and soloists such as Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Ensemble contemporain de Montréal, Esprit Orchestra, Ensemble Résonance, code d'accès, Traquen'art, GroundSwell, Pro Coro Canada, Innovations en concert, Jean-François Guay, Laura Wilcox, Jean-Guy Boisvert, lanza-Sheppard Duo, Trio Fibonacci, Trio Phoenix, Duo Kovalis, the Penderecki and Molinari String Quartets, the Logos Foundation, and the Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton and Montréal Symphony Orchestras.

Miroslav Spasov, composer of instrumental and live electroacoustic music, was born in Skopje (R of Macedonia) in 1964. He earned his PhD in Composition at the University of Calgary in 2002 (Allan Bell and David Eagle). Currently he is a Professor of Composition and Computer Music Techniques in the Music/Music Technology Programme at Keele University in the UK. His works have been performed by various ensembles and soloists such as Janacek Philharmonic Orchestra (Czech Republic), New London Chamber Choir (UK), Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra (Canada), János Négyesy and Päivikki Nykter (USA), Leonid Pejsahov and Nadezda Pozarickaya (Canada), Sarah Watts and Michael Bell (UK), Ankara Wind Quintet (Turkey) and others. A number of performances were broadcasted on radio and TV such as WKCR 89.9, Manhattan, New York City, BBC Manchester, CBC Montreal and others.

Christiaan’s love of music began at an early age and has been a part of his life since he can remember. His goal is to write expressive and uplifting music that excites both audience and performers.
Christiaan received his Bachelor of Music in Composition from the University of Calgary (2005) where he studied composition and clarinet. His composition mentors included Allan Bell, Miroslav Spasov, David Eagle, Hope Lee, and William Jordan. At the University of Calgary he wrote music for the University of Calgary Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, Harmoniemusik Ensemble, Percussion Ensemble, Saxophone Quartet, and soloists. He also played clarinet in the University of Calgary Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, Symphonic Band and a variety of chamber groups. It was during his studies that Christiaan won the 2003 Land’s End Chamber Ensemble Composers Competition award for his piano trio “Changing of the Autumn Leaves”.

Zachary Wadsworth’s “vivid, vital, and prismatic” music has established him as a leading composer of his generation. His compositions have been heard in venues around the world, from Washington’s Kennedy Center to Tokyo‘s Takinogawa Hall, and have been performed by such ensembles as the choir of Westminster Abbey, the Yale Schola Cantorum, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Atlanta Philharmonic Orchestra. As the 2012-13 recipient of the Douglas Moore Fellowship for American Opera, Wadsworth was in residence at the Metropolitan Opera and the Santa Fe Opera. In 2014, he had his Carnegie Hall debut.

ARTHUR WARD (June 3, 1915 - September 27, 2009) was a composer, teacher, and organist. He had a Master of Music in Composition from the University of Calgary, where "he came under the influence of Richard Johnston, Gregory Levin and William Jordan". His works have been both published and recorded, and include mainly music for organ, chorus, and recorder.