John Kameel Farah

John Kameel Farah is a Canadian composer, pianist and visual artist whose work embraces aspects of baroque and early music, experimental, contemporary classical, improvisation, middle-eastern music and forms of electronic music.

He studied composition and piano performance at the University of Toronto, where he received the Glenn Gould Composition Award twice during his studies. In 1999 he had private lessons with Terry Riley in California, and later at the Arabic Music Retreat in Hartford.

Farah continues to compose for ensembles and film, but largely focuses on live solo concerts, using a setup which surrounds the piano with synthesizers, as well as processing the piano through computer filters and effects. His music draws upon an interest in astronomy, history, mythology and painting. As a visual artist, his intricate ink drawings have been presented at solo and group exhibitions.

He occasionally presents his side-project, “Music for Organ and Synthesizers”, looping and altering the pipe organ’s sound in combination with analog and digital synths in various church settings, which has attracted great interest from electronic music fans.