Neil Cockburn

PhD, FRCO

Head of Organ Studies, Mount Royal University

ncockburn@mtroyal.ca

International prize-winning organist Neil Cockburn has been a central figure in the development of a musical culture of the pipe organ in Calgary and Western Canada since 2000, when he became Head of Organ Studies at Mount Royal Conservatory. He won First Prize at the 1996 Dublin International Organ Competition, and has received numerous other prestigious awards, including the W. T. Best Memorial Organ Scholarship (UK), a scholarship from the Countess of Munster Musical Trust (UK), and the Lili Boulanger Memorial Fund Prize — awarded by an international panel of judges.

He received his musical education at Oxford University (BA Hons, Music), the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, UK (MusM, Organ Performance, and the Professional Peformance Diploma, PPRNCM), the Conservatoire Nationale de Région Rueil-Malmaison, France (Premier prix de perfectionnement), and the University of Calgary (PhD, Musicology). His formative teachers and mentors include David Sanger, Margaret Phillips, Dame Gillian Weir, and Victor Coelho. Celebrated for his diverse repertoire interests and expertise, he is known particularly for his many concerto performances with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra. He has given an all-encompassing spectrum of solo organ recitals on a wide range of instrument types, from all-Bach recitals on historically-inspired organs, to symphonic programmes on romantic instruments, and concerts of entirely new works.

Neil is also active in the field of Early Music. He is the continuo player and organist for the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, frequently performing under the direction of guest conductor Ivars Taurins. Working with lute players Victor Coelho and David Dolata and the group “Il Furioso,” he performed harpsichord continuo on two recordings of early seventeenth-century Italian repertoire for the Toccata Classics label: recordings of the music of G.G. Kapsberger and B. Castaldi. He was Director of the Early Music Ensemble of the University of Calgary for four years.

He has directed three Pipe Organ Encounter camps in Calgary for young beginner organists, and has taught courses for the Royal College of Organists (UK), the Guild of Church Musicians (UK), the Royal School of Church Music, the St. Giles International Organ School (London, UK), the Rochester NY Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, Oundle International Summer School for Young Organists, and was elected one of two national Travelling Clinicians for the Royal Canadian College of Organists in the 2002/3 season. He held the University of Calgary’s Cantos Music Foundation Organ Scholarship, a guest faculty position, celebrating the inauguration of the new North German Baroque organ built by the Ahrend Organ Company of Germany from 2006 until 2009.