Arthur M. Bachmann

Arthur M. Bachmann (b. March 27, 1961) was born and raised in Calgary, where he began studying viola. He completed a Bachelor of Musical Arts degree in viola performance and an Artist Diploma in Performance at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, and played professionally with Orchestra London for three of his years there. In 1984 he moved to Vancouver to study viola with Gerald Stanick, and then attended the Advanced Studies in Music winter program at the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts.

In 1986 Bachmann won a viola position with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra. He played with the orchestra for 39 years and retired at the end of the 2024–25 season.

Bachmann composed from the age of 13 until he was 19, then wrote very little for almost eleven years before returning to composition in 1991. He became an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre in 1997. He has written commissioned works for ensembles and arts organizations, and has arranged music for many kinds of ensembles, including pops charts for symphony orchestra and soloists. Calgary Opera commissioned his chamber opera What Brought Us Here, which premiered in September 2012. Cowtown Opera in Calgary commissioned and premiered a second chamber opera, Annie Davidson, in September 2015. The Calgary Philharmonic commissioned his flute concerto Daughter of Elysium, a companion piece to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, which principal flute Sara Hahn premiered during the 2015–16 season.

His music has been performed in Canada, the United States and Europe, recorded for CBC Radio, and released on several CDs, among them the Kensington Sinfonia’s Views from the Americas, which includes his Nauthiz. He writes in contemporary classical idioms, with melody and a sense of tonality at the centre, and much of his work draws on the Alberta landscapes around Calgary.

Biography from Canadian Music Centre