John David Bryson Burge (born 2 January 1961) is a Canadian composer, music educator, and pianist. He has won a number of awards for his compositions, including the Alberta Culture Award (1982), the William Erving Fairclough Scholarship (1983), second prize in the Ithaca College Choral Composition Contest and Festival (1984), and five PROCAN Young Composers' Competition prizes between 1985 and 1988 among others. In 2009 he won the Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year for his Flanders Fields Reflections. Some music critics have likened his compositional style to that of Benjamin Britten and Maxwell Davies.

Born in Dryden, Ontario, Burge earned an associate degree from The Royal Conservatory of Music in 1979. He remained at the school, earning a bachelor's degree in 1983 and a master's degree in 1984. He earned a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of British Columbia in 1989. Among his teachers in music composition were John Beckwith, Stephen Chatman, Walter Buczynski, John Hawkins, and Derek Holman.

John Burge

In 1987 Burge joined the music faculty at Queen's University where he continues to teach music theory, analysis and composition. He formerly served as the director of the Queen's School of Music.

John Burge

Burge's compositions have been performed by numerous notable ensembles, including the BBC Singers, the Elmer Iseler Singers, the Hart House Chorus, the Nepean Symphony Orchestra, the Thirteen Strings Chamber Orchestra, the New York City Gay Men's Chorus, and the Michigan State University Children's Choir. His opera The Master's House was commissioned by the Opera Lyra Ottawa and premiered by the organization in 1984. In 1986 the Choir of Christ Church Cathedral performed his "So Great Is God's Love" with Diana, Princess of Wales and Charles, Prince of Wales in attendance. In 2004 his Clarinet Concerto was premiered by the Kingston Symphony.

John Burge

References

1961 births

20th-century classical composers

21st-century classical composers

Canadian classical composers

Canadian male classical composers

Canadian classical pianists

Male classical pianists

Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year winners

Living people

Canadian opera composers

Male opera composers

People from Dryden, Ontario

Academic staff of Queen's University at Kingston

The Royal Conservatory of Music alumni

University of British Columbia School of Music alumni

20th-century Canadian pianists

Canadian male pianists

21st-century classical pianists

20th-century Canadian male musicians

21st-century Canadian male musicians