First Prize Laureate R. Murray Schafer To Receive Honorary Doctorate

By Penny Johnson, Contributing Author

Later this month at a series of convocations to be held June 21-23, Montréal's Concordia University will bestow honorary doctoral degrees to seven distinguished Canadians, including composer, writer, music educator and environmentalist and First Glenn Gould Prize Laureate (1987), R. Murray Schafer. 

As one of Canada's pre-eminent composers, Schafer has written in nearly every musical genre including theatre, orchestral, choral, vocal and chamber, his ten string quartets holding a significant place in the repertoire.  A pioneer in the field of acoustic ecology, Schafer is the author of The Tuning of the World (1977), a work documenting the results of his World Soundscape Project.  

Born in Sarnia, Ontario in 1933, Schafer received his Licentiate in piano from the Royal Schools of Music in London.  During the early 1950's, Schafer studied piano at the Royal Conservatory of Music - then the Toronto Conservatory of Music - with Alberto Guerrero, who several years earlier had taught Glenn Gould.  It was at this time that Schafer also studied for a brief period at the University of Toronto, where he came into contact with Marshall McLuhan, one of the most lasting and significant influences on the intellectual development of the young composer.   

The recipient of numerous awards and distinctions including the Canada Council Molson Prize for the Arts (1993); Louis Applebaum Composers Award (1999); SOCAN Jan V. Matejcek Concert Music Award (2001) and the Governor General's Performing Arts Award (2009), Schafer became the first Laureate of The Glenn Gould Prize - an international award which the Toronto Star recently referred to as "the Nobel prize of the arts" - after being selected by a distinguished international jury chaired by Canadian operatic icon, Maureen Forrester.  At the awards ceremony, the late, Sir Yehudi Menuhin - a member of the jury, who subsequently became the laureate of The Second Glenn Gould Prize - praised Schafer for his "strong, benevolent, and highly original imagination and intellect, a dynamic power whose manifold personal expression and aspirations are in total accord with the urgent needs and dreams of humanity today."

Schafer will receive his honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Fine Arts at Concordia University on June 23.  Other doctoral honorees include Laurent Beaudoin, CC, FCA, OQ (Former CEO and current Chair of Bombardier Inc.); Robert Charlebois, OC, OQ (Singer, Songwriter); Jean Chrétien, PC, OM, CC, QC (Former Prime Minister of Canada); Julie Payette, CQ (Astronaut, Engineer); Richard W. Pound, OC, OQ (Founding Chair, World Anti-Doping Agency, former Vice President, International Olympic Committee) and Eleanor Wachtel, CM (CBC Radio Broadcaster).