Mark Edwards

  • Associate Professor of Harpsichord
  • Director, Historical Performance Program

Education

  • BMus, highest distinction, Eastman School of Music
  • MM, McGill University and the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg
  • PhD, Leiden University

Biography

First-prize winner of the Musica Antiqua Bruges International Harpsichord Competition, Canadian harpsichordist and organist Mark Edwards is recognized for his captivating performances, bringing the listener “to new and unpredictable regions, using all of the resources of his instrument...of his virtuosity, and of his imagination” (La Libre Belgique). He began teaching at Oberlin Conservatory in 2016.

Edwards has given solo recitals at a number of prominent festivals and concert series, including the Utrecht Early Music Festival, Bozar (Brussels), and the Montreal Baroque Festival. He has had concerto performances with a number of award-winning ensembles, including Il Gardellino (Belgium), Neobarock (Germany), Ensemble Caprice (Canada), and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. An active chamber musician, he is the artistic director of Poiesis, collaborates regularly with Les Boréades de Montréal and Les Délices (Cleveland), and has performed with ensembles including Tafelmusik, Il Pomo d’Oro, and Pallade Musica.

Edwards' debut solo CD, Orpheus Descending, was released in 2017 and was reviewed warmly. Passaggi (ATMA 2013), his CD with the Canadian recorder player Vincent Lauzer, was nominated for an ADISQ award. His performances have been broadcast by American Public Media, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Klara (Belgium), and Radio 4 (Netherlands).

In 2021, Edwards earned a PhD from Leiden University after successfully defending his dissertation titled “Moving Early Music: Improvisation and the Work-Concept in Seventeenth-Century French Keyboard Performance.” His former teachers include Robert Hill, William Porter, Hank Knox, and David Higgs.

First-prize winner at the 2012 Musica Antique Bruges International Harpsichord Competition

Notes

Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute Awarded EMA's 2020 Goldberg Award

March 10, 2020

The Early Music America 2020 Laurette Goldberg Award, for achievement in early music outreach, has been awarded to the Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute (BPI). The summer institute's faculty is led by Artistic Director Kenneth Slowik and four Oberlin Conservatory faculty members who make up the Oberlin Baroque Ensemble—Mark Edwards, Michael Lynn, Marilyn McDonald, Catharina Meints. 

Oberlin's BPI was created in 1972 by former Oberlin Conservatory oboe professor James Caldwell in order to bring famous Swiss musician, August Wenzinger, to the United States to perform, teach, and conduct. Catharina Meints, who was closely involved with the beginnings of BPI, continues to be the senior faculty member 48 years later.

On behalf of the faculty and participants of BPI, Catharine Meints said: “I can say that we are delighted to receive recognition from EMA for our work over the last 49 years. We are proud of what we have accomplished and are honored to be presented the Goldberg Award.”

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