Johnny Cowell

2005 TMA149 Lifetime Achievement Award Recipient

At the December 4, 2005 General Meeting, composer, arranger and trumpet player Johnny Cowell was honoured with the presentation of the TMA’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Though Johnny’s curriculum vitae fills pages with impressive accomplishments and awards, the Lifetime Achievement Award is special in that it recognizes an entire lifetime’s worth of outstanding work in music.

Johnny seems to have had plans for a lifetime in music as early as 1932, when at age 6, he performed his first trumpet solo. He went on to become the youngest member of the Toronto Symphony Band, at age 15. After WWII, and his service with the Royal Canadian Navy Band, Johnny’s pursued his interest in composition, winning a scholarship in composition from the Royal Conservatory. This led to a second, parallel career as a highly successful composer. Career highlights include international hit songs such as Walk Hand in Hand and Our Winter Love, recordings of his compositions by such luminaries as Vera Lynn, Chet Atkins, Lawrence Welk, Andy Williams, The Guess Who, and others, as well as prestigious commissions, such as a fanfare for Governor General Jeanne Sauve in 1984, and for Her Majesty The Queen at the opening of the Metro Convention Centre. But Johnny never put down his trumpet, and in fact his association with the Toronto Symphony lasted more than 50 years. His most recent recording — The Art of Johnny Cowell: Virtuoso Trumpet Gems — contains performances as recent as 1996.

At the presentation, President Rosemary Galloway read Johnny’s astonishing list of achievements to an appreciative audience. In his acceptance speech, Johnny noted that he’d been a member of the TMA for 63 years — yet another impressive achievement.