- Daniel Pinkham
- MSR Music
- Toronto Symphony Orchestra
- Carol Lazier
- Accent Records
- Benjamin Burns
- Gaetan Vermeulem
- Mahler: Symphony No 9
Colin Tilney
British-born Canadian harpsichordist, pianist, chamber organ, clavichord and fortepiano player and teacher Colin Graham Tilney was born in London on 31 October 1933. He studied harpsichord with Arnold Dolmetsch pupil Mary Potts at Cambridge University and later with Gustav Leonhardt in Amsterdam.
He began his career as an accompanist and opera coach at Sadler's Wells and the New Opera Company, then became a specialist in performing in a historically informed way on early keyboard instruments, but was also interested in, commissioned and played contemporary music. He was the harpsichord for Igor Stravinsky on the 1964 Columbia recording of The Rake's Progress, he gave the first London performance of Hans Werner Henze's Lucy Escott Variations and commissioned music by Elisabeth Lutyens and Priaulx Rainier.
He moved from Kent to Canada in 1979, settling in Toronto, where he continued to perform, with the Toronto Consort and the Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra. He also taught at the Royal Conservatory of Music and at Toronto University. He founded the chamber ensemble Les Coucous Bénévoles in 1985, which initially performed J S Bach, Handel and Scarlatti, but later began performing the music of modern Canadian composers.
His many recordings on fortepiano and harpsichord have been issued on various labels, and he has broadcast for the CBC and BBC. With a repertoire ranging from the Elizabethan virginalists to Louis Andriessen, Tilney recorded music by R Murray Schafer, Linda Catlin Smith, Rodney Sharman and also much early and baroque music. He also edited previously unpublished harpsichord music and wrote a performance guide for Bach's English Suites.
Colin Tilney (1933-2024)
He moved to Victoria, British Columbia in 2002, continuing to perform and teach.
Colin Tilney died on 17 December 2024, aged ninety-one.