Award-winning saxophonist Michael Ibrahim performs actively as an international soloist and chamber musician. His performances of concerti, recital repertoire, and new music have attracted much attention to the young Canadian concert artist.

The recent winner of the 2007 Eisenberg-Fried Concerto Competition for Woodwinds and the 2006 Performance Prize for Contemporary Music in Darmstadt, Germany, Ibrahim also won first-place at the North American Saxophone Alliance Classical Artist Competition, MTNA Woodwind Collegiate Artist Competition, and second-place at the 32nd CBC National Competition for Young Performers. As a chamber musician, he has also won first-place at the Coleman Chamber Music Competition and the MTNA Chamber Music Competition. Ibrahim has given solo performances in France, Russia, Italy, Germany, Austria, and Holland. Recent engagements include Luciano Berio’s Chemins IVb for saxophone and chamber orchestra, Louis Andriessen’s Hout, the North American premiere of Pierre Boulez’s Dialogue de l’ombre double and several premieres of works by emerging composers. As an Albertan solo performer, he performed to a sold-out audience at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. His performances can be heard on CBC Radio.

Saxophonist for the Fireworks Ensemble, “the hottest new classical band in New York” (New Music Connoisseur), he has also appeared with ensembles including the PRISM Saxophone Quartet, SEM Ensemble, Columbia Sinfonietta, TACTUS Contemporary Ensemble, Riot, Red Light New Music, Amp, and the Long Island Concert Pops Orchestra. Outside of New York, he has performed with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, Red Deer Symphony Orchestra, Junge Deutsche Philharmonie, Faenza International Saxophone Orchestra, and the META4 Saxophone Quartet.

His debut CD “Bach: For Saxophone” covers solo transcriptions and a concerto performed with the Players Chamber Ensemble, conducted by Dan Bartholomew. His repertoire includes all periods of the saxophone’s history, from the early impressionistic beginning to the contemporary present. He is passionate about establishing the saxophone as a solo instrument in today’s classical world. Apart from his interpretation of transcribed, traditional, and contemporary repertoires, he also works with jazz, funk, and improvisation. Working as a commercial musician, he has recorded with a number of pop artists.

Ibrahim was born in Vancouver and grew up in Saskatchewan. He studied at the University of Regina; the University of Calgary; Université Européenne de Saxophone in Gap, France; Bowling Green State University; Karlheinz Stockhausen Course in Kürten, Germany; and the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany. His principal teachers include Karen Finnsson, Jeremy Brown, John Sampen, Claude Delangle, Suzanne Stephens, Marcus Weiss, and Paul Cohen. After having taught at the University of Calgary and Mount Royal College, he currently freelances in New York while completing his doctoral studies at the Manhattan School of Music.