Michael Farquharson

Michael Farquharson spent the first 25 years of his career as a freelance bassist, writer, producer and engineer in Toronto, Canada until moving to Boston in 1996 to take a position as Professor, Contemporary Writing and Production at Berklee College of Music.

During his time in Toronto, he wrote, engineered, produced or performed on over 170 albums, 600 jingles and countless other TV, Radio and multi media recordings.

He has toured, recorded with, and performed with the likes of Michael Brecker, Brian Auger and Eric Burden, BS&T, Tom Jones, Dionne Warwick, Marc Jordan, Toronto Symphony, Canada Pops Orchestra, etc.

He has recorded 5 solo albums, one of which, the self titled album “Michael Farquharson” on the MCA/Jazz Inspiration label, was nominated for a Juno award in 1993 as Best Contemporary Jazz Album of the Year. He also recorded another album, “The Arrival” for the Jazz Inspiration label. He has recorded two albums, “Silent Picture” and “Della by Moonlight” in collaboration with good friend and colleague, Matthew Nicholl. They will be recording their 3rd album together starting December, 2012. Michael recorded another album in collaboration with Ben Schwendener, “Picture Time” which featured compositions using the Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization.

He has received 2 prestigious Canada Council arts awards for composition, one Ontario Arts Council Award and was nominated on several occasions for the Toronto Music Awards.

Michael graduated from Humber College in Toronto, and graduated with a Masters Degree in Jazz Studies from the New England Conservatory, all with honours and distinction in performance.

He is also the author of the Berklee Press book, “Writer, Producer, Engineer” and has been a regular contributor to the periodicals “Canadian Musician” and “Bassics”.

In his spare time, Michael holds an FAA Airline Transport Pilot certificate, and flies corporate light jets around the United States and Canada for Linear Air.