Nationality: Canadian

COULTHARD, Jean

Photo of Jean Coulthard by Andreas Poulsson; courtesy of The Canadian Encyclopedia

Born in Vancouver, Feb 10, 1908
Died in Vancouver, March 9, 2000

Jean Coulthard (pronounced “Jeen Coal-thard,” despite its French appearance) was the first composer from Western Canada to receive wide recognition.
From 1928-1930, Coulthard studied at the Royal College of Music under Vaughan Williams and continued composition studies through the next decade or so under such notable names as Copland, Milhaud, Schoenberg, Bartók, and Bernard Wagenaar, among others.
Coulthard’s unique musical voice was influenced by the vast array of influences she studied under and is characterized by a dichotomy of lyrical romanticism and brooding introspection.
She was also a respected educator and taught composition at the University of British Columbia for nearly 30 years.¹

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Born in Montréal on December 30, 1901
Died in Montréal on July 18, 1982

Daunais was a Canadian baritone, composer, and stage director.
As a director, Daunais specialized in operetta. He directed operetta in Montréal and on CBC TV.²

“There is a droll spirit in your music, and if someone points it out to you, don’t blush. It’s a rare gift!”
Francis Poulenc to Lionel Daunais³

Born in Drummondsville, ON, Oct 11, 1882
Died in Battle Creek, MI, Oct 2, 1943

Robert Nathaniel Dett was born in Drummondville, Ontario, Canada (now part of Niagara Falls, Ontario). His ancestors were among the freedom-seekers who had escaped to Canada via the Underground Railroad. (In fact, Drummondville was a community founded by freedom-seekers.)⁴
Dett’s formal musical education was substantial, to say the least.
- Dett attended Oberlin Conservatory, where he was the first person of African Descent to graduate from the institution with a double major in piano performance and composition in 1908.
- He would later be awarded honorary doctorates from both Oberlin and Howard University. Dett was the first Black alumnus to receive an honorary doctorate from Oberlin.
- Dett received his Master’s Degree from Eastman School of Music over 20 years after graduating from Oberlin. And in 1929, he studied with Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France.⁵
Dett was a choral conductor who taught for almost two decades at the Hampton Institute, now Hampton University, a historically Black university.
- Under his leadership, the Hampton Singers rose to artistic prominence, touring internationally and singing for President Herbert Hoover.⁶
As a composer, Dett published around 100 works, primarily pieces for piano, voice, and choir. He is best remembered for his arrangements of folksongs and spirituals.⁷

Born in Toronto, ON, July 24, 1917
Died in Guernsey, April 22, 2005

Farnon was an arranger, conductor and composer.
He came to Britain as the conductor of the Canadian Band of the Allied Expeditionary Force in in 1944 in WWII (his American bandmaster counterpart was Glenn Miller).
Farnon wrote many film scores and TV themes, and in his later career his made arrangements for Tony Bennett, Bing Crosby, Lena Horne, Sarah Vaughan and other pop singers.⁸

Born in Montreal, Feb 18, 1929
Died in Montreal, Jun 2, 1968

Composer and pianist André Mathieu was a child prodigy and showed incredible musical aptitude from a young age. At age four, he composed and performed his first work, Trois Études.
While still a child, Mathieu received a government grant to study piano with Yves Nat and and harmony and composition with Jacques de la Presle in Paris.
- About a decade later, Mathieu returned to Paris to study composition with Arthur Honegger and piano with Jules Gentil.
Sadly, once Mathieu reached his 20s, his fame began to decline. His musical development and innovation seemed to plateau, and he could never recover from it. The composer died at just 39 years old in relative obscurity.
Fun fact – due to his recognition as a brilliant child prodigy, he was nicknamed “the Canadian Mozart.”
- Additional fun fact – both the welcoming song and the theme music for the 1976 Montreal Olympics were arrangements of Mathieu’s music.
Family Connection – André’s father was also a known musician – composer, pianist, and educator Rodolphe Mathieu.⁹

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Biography from The Canadian Encyclopedia

Photo of Lubomyr Melnyk by Hreinn Gudlaugsson, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Born in Ukraine in 1948

This composer lives and works in Canada.¹⁰ His family emigrated there when he was a child.
Melnyk studied piano as a child, and majored in Latin and Philosophy at St Paul’s College in Winnipeg.¹¹
Melnyk specializes in piano and utilizes a compositional style he calls “continuous music,” which is improvisational and minimalist. His influences include Ravi Shankar, Steve Reich, and Ukrainian folk music.¹²