Donald Alexander Cochrane

Donald Alexander Cochrane, Canadian composer and pianist was born in eastern Ontario. After high-school graduation he moved to New York City to study piano under Dr. Alexander Klahr, a former associate of the University of Vienna, Austria. He earned his BSc. degree from Columbia University, NYC. After that, he proceeded to study music composition with Dr. Hans Sachsse of the Munich High School for Music. For twenty-five years Cochrane worked as a high-school music department head in the Toronto area. After retirement, he continued work with computer music software.[2]

He is a prolific composer whose oeuvre consists of 12 piano concerti (the last one was written in 2008), 10 symphonies, the last in 2004, 2 albums of piano music, 6 sets of orchestral variations, chamber music, a viola concerto for small Orchestra, 2 string quartets, 2 piano quintets, woodwind quintet, brass quintet, clarinet quartet, saxophone quartet, vocal music, settings from William Blake’s "Songs of Innocence" – a capella – with piano accompaniment, an Odyssey, a cantata with original text for orchestra and mixed choir, a Tragic Tale (an allegory for narrator and symphony orchestra) and Evangel, an Oratorio for solo voices, mixed choir and symphony orchestra. Cochrane is well known for his compositions for quartets of various instrumentation.[3] Further, Cochrane's piece, Quintoporany, a brass quintet can be found on Pro Music.[4] A sample of the score is also available.[5]

At present, Cochrane lives in Ontario and is currently working on a suite for harpsichord, piano and small orchestra. He could be considered one of Canada's important composers. Many of his compositions for piano have been performed by Canadian pianists, including Yaroslav Senyshyn. At the current time, many of Cochrane's performed compositions can be found on iTunes.