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This project was made possible by funding through the Canadian Culture Online Strategy and the Heritage Policy Branch of the Department of Canadian Heritage.

Canadian Heritage

Doug Watson

Biography

DOUG WATSON (saxophonist, clarinetist, flutist, pianist, harpsichordist, and organist) has been a mainstay on the Toronto jazz scene for over thirty years as a musician, jazz educator, and radio broadcaster. Well-known as a long-time radio host and live concert producer ("Sound of Toronto Jazz" Concert Series) at JAZZ.FM91, Watson has sustained a three-decade parallel career as a multi-instrumentalist, composer, jazz educator, and lecturer, He originally made his name as a jazz player in major clubs throughout Toronto working with luminaries including Ed Bickert, Jim Galloway, Don Thompson, Guido Basso, Jake Langley, Kollage, Norman Marshall Villeneuve, and many, many others.

Continuing to maintain a busy schedule of jazz club appearances as a polished saxophonist, Watson also performs a broader range of music as a pianist, harpsichordist, and organist. He holds a Bachelor of Music Degree in Composition from the University of Toronto and has composed film scores, choral and chamber music, and numerous jazz pieces for various ensembles. He has taught piano, organ, saxophone, clarinet, flute, music theory & analysis, and music history, currently teaching privately at The Education Centre at Long & McQuade. He has been the organist at Mt. Zion United Church in Pickering since January of 1997.

Doug Watson began his broadcast career in 1985 as a jazz radio host at the University of Toronto's CIUT-FM 89.5, continuing to be heard on that station until 1994. He was employed as a popular broadcaster and concert producer at Canada’s premier jazz radio station, JAZZ.FM91 in Toronto from 1999 to 2005, years during which he was nominated three times as the National Jazz Awards’ “Broadcaster of The Year”. He now hosts an internet jazz radio show on IndieTalent.ca on which he airs Canadian jazz exclusively. The show is self-produced and recorded in his home studio. A new episode airs the first Saturday of each month with several repeats of each episode during the month following. He is also in demand on the lecture circuit delivering talks on "Jazz History", "Jazz & Popular Music Of The '50s & '60s" and "A History Of Canadian Music". His lectures examine these music genres from historical, analytical, and evaluative perspectives.

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