Noted for his boldly original forms, eerie reworkings of familiar musical material and phantasmagorical orchestrations, Chris Paul Harman (b. 1970, Toronto) is one of Canada's most esteemed composers.
Mr. Harman first came to prominence in his early twenties, with a series of major orchestral commissions from the CBC Radio Orchestra, the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and the Esprit Orchestra. Mr. Harman was a finalist in the CBC National Competition for Young Composers in 1986, when he was only fifteen, and went on to win the Grand Prize in the same competition in 1990 for Iridescence. Although largely self-taught as a composer, Mr. Harman studied classical guitar, cello and electronic music with Barton Wigg, Alan Stellings and Wes Wragget. He went on to earn a PhD in composition from the University of Birmingham (2012) while holding an adjunct professorship at McGill University's Schulich School of Music. Since 2014, he has been Associate Professor of Composition at McGill University.
Other honors include Iridesence, which was selected as a work at the 1991 International Rostrum of Composers in Paris, and his Concerto for oboe and strings, which was chosen as a recommended work at the 1994 International Rostrum of Composers. Uta (Concerto for viola and orchestra) received an honorable mention at the prestigious Gaudeamus International Music Week (Netherlands) in 2001. Mr. Harman won the Jules Léger Prize (Canada's highest distinction for new chamber music) in 2001 and 2007.
His works have been commissioned and performed by numerous international orchestras and ensembles, including Asko Ensemble (Amsterdam), Camerata Aberta (Sao Paolo), Continuum (Toronto), Esprit Orchestra (Toronto), Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Nieuw Ensemble (Amsterdam), Noordhollands Philharmonisch (Amsterdam), Philharmonia Orchestra (London), Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, St. Lawrence String Quartet (Stanford), Ensemble la SMCQ (Montréal), Tokyo Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Trio Fibonacci (Montréal) and Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Lawrence String Quartet (Stanford), Ensemble de la SMCQ (Montreal), Tokyo Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Trio Fibonacci (Montreal) and Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.
Also a renowned pedagogue, Mr. Harman was on faculty as a guest artist at the soundSCAPE 2017 Summer Festival (Cesena, Italy) in addition to the Soundstreams Emerging Composers Workshop 2017 (Toronto) as a composition mentor.
