Graham is thrilled to be in London for his second season with Orchestra London. He recently received his Master’s degree in orchestral performance from McGill University, where he was a first-prize winner of the 2007 CBC/McGill competition. In a concert given with the McGill Symphony Orchestra later that year, Graham’s concerto performance was hailed by the Montreal Gazette as a “triumph”, describing his sound as “bright, direct and perfectly suited to Copland.” He has appeared in concert with such ensembles as the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony (with whom he is now a regular substitute), Toronto Summer Music Academy and Festival, Allegra Chamber Music in Montreal, and the Contrasts Chamber Music Festival in Vancouver, of which he was also the artistic director. Earlier in 2009, Graham performed works by Reich and Stravinsky live and in studio session during his brief stay at the Banff Centre for the Arts as a Senior Artist in Residence.
At McGill, Graham’s studio teacher was Robert Crowley, principal clarinet of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, and he also studied chamber music and orchestral repertoire with Alain Desgagné and Michael Dumouchel. A native Vancouverite, he studied with Wesley Foster at the University of British Columbia, where he completed his Bachelor’s degree. Thanks in part to schools and festivals he attended during his studies, Graham is honoured to have performed in masterclasses with such distinguished artists as David Shifrin, Richard Stoltzman, James Campbell, John Bruce Yeh, Kimball Sykes, and the Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet.
Graham is grateful for national training programs such as the National Academy Orchestra in Hamilton, where he spent two summers performing a great number of major works from the repertoire. He also enjoyed his time with the National Youth Orchestra of Canada, with whom he toured across the country twice, garnering critical acclaim from reviewers coast to coast for his performance in, among others, Bartók’s Miraculous Mandarin Suite. This work, as well as many others Graham recorded with the NYOC, have been heard on CBC Radio.
