Michael Horwood is an American-Canadian composer living in Canada since 1971. He studied music composition and theory at the State University of New York at Buffalo with Lejaren Hiller, Lukas Foss, and István Anhalt, receiving his BA in Music (1969) and MA in Music Composition and Theory (1971). From 1972–2003 Horwood was a professor of music and humanities at Humber College of Applied Arts and Technology in Toronto. During the latter half of the 1970’s, Horwood formed Convergence, an improvisation ensemble in which he played piano and percussion. In 2003 he retired from teaching and with his wife moved to Cowley, Alberta.

His more than 70 compositions span a wide variety of contemporary idioms including 12-tone, avant-garde, theatre pieces, electroacoustic (both live and pre-recorded), jazz, minimalism and neo-romanticism. He has written for conventional ensembles, unusual instrumental combinations and even flexible scoring. Among his most successful works have been those which involve extra-musical concepts such as his chamber works Birds (1979) and Nervous Disorder (1988), the electroacoustic work Motility (rev. 1986), and the orchestral works Amusement Park Suite (1986), National Park Suite (1991), and Symphony No. 2, Visions of a Wounded Earth (1995).

Traits that have emerged from the deliberate variety in Horwood’s music include an acute sense of sonority and exploiting the unique ranges and timbres of his instrumental forces. This use of instrumental sound is occasionally coupled with an overt sense of theatricality or humor, even in his non-theater works.

Since the late 1980’s, many of Horwood’s compositions have returned to his original interest in Romantic period music. In 1995 he completed a co-commission (through the Canada Council) from four Canadian orchestras for his most ambitious work to date — a 50 minute choral symphony, Symphony No. 2, Visions of a Wounded Earth, with texts from eight Canadian poets on the state of the environment. 1996 saw the commission (Windsor Symphony) of a short chamber orchestra piece on the theme of “morning”, Do You Live for Weekends?, as well as the un-commissioned, Symphony No. 3, Andromeda. Another multiple orchestral commission (through the Ontario Arts Council) followed in 1997, the piano concerto Intravariations, for pianist Mary Kenedi. Later that year the Festival of the Sound (Parry Sound, Ontario) commissioned him for Quartzite Dialogues, a work for narrator and wind quintet. In October, 1999, he created the piano work, T + I = Ewigkeit, based on a theme by Wagner. In 2000 he adapted the interludes from his 2nd symphony as an independent orchestral work, Three Interludes. A new version of his early Concerto for Double Bass and String Orchestra was issued in 2003. In 2006 two commissioned works (through the Alberta Foundation for the Arts) were composed: Fragments, a duo for any two treble instruments for the St. Crispin’s Chamber Ensemble, and Piano Sonata — Preludes, Elegy and Dances for Mary Kenedi. Four orchestral works (Amusement Park Suite, National Park Suite, Intravariations and Symphony No. 1) were released in July, 2007, on an Albany Records CD (TROY-943) with Ian Hobson, Joseph Kubera and the Sinfonia Varsovia under the album title Suite and Serious. Piece Percussionique No. 6 (2008) was commissioned by the Toronto Percussion Ensemble for Horwood’s complete music for percussion CD. The 2008 WCMA (Western Canadian Music Awards) nominated Three Interludes (ERM Media, Masterworks of the New Era, Vol. 10) as best classical composition of the year and the Suite and Serious CD (Albany Records) was nominated for best classical album of the year. In 2009 the Calgary Philharmonic performed Do You live for Weekends? during a two-day new music event in Calgary called Hear and Now. Also that year Horwood’s all-percussion CD, Percussionique, performed by the Toronto Percussion Ensemble, was released on Albany Records (TROY1122).