Originally from Toronto, Canada, Michael Unger currently resides in Rochester, New York, USA, where he is completing doctoral studies at the Eastman School of Music. Michael holds masters’ degrees in both organ and harpsichord from Eastman, and is also a graduate of the University of Western Ontario, where he was the recipient of the University Gold Medal in Music. He has been a student and teaching assistant of David Higgs and William Porter, and has also studied with Ethel Briggs, Sandra Mangsen, Joel Speerstra and the late Larry Cortner. Additional studies have included European summer academies specializing in historical keyboard performance.
In 2008, Michael was the first Canadian to be awarded both first prize and audience prize in the American Guild of Organists’ National Young Artists Competition in Organ Performance (NYACOP). Also in 2008, he was awarded first prize in the 6th International Organ Competition Musashino-Tokyo, where he also received the Yoshida Minoru Memorial Award, the Toyota Mayor’s Award, and the Tokorozawa MUSE Award. In 2007, he was awarded two of Canada’s top scholarships for organ and church music, the Lilian Forsyth and Godfrey Hewitt Memorial Scholarships. Other awards include Eastman’s Jerald C. Graue Fellowship for musicology in 2007, and the Association for Canadian Choral Conductors’ Composition Competition in 2002.
Michael performs solo recitals in the United States, Canada and Europe, and is also active as a chamber musician and continuo player. He has served as the Director of Music of Rochester’s South Presbyterian Church since 2002.
