Composer

Pouya Hamidi thrives on the magic of creating music in the moment, the miracle of collaboration, the mystery of sharing ineffable beauty with other musicians and audiences alike.

He was born in 1986 to the sound of sirens over Tehran during the Iran/Iraq war. As a boy he’d escape the city every Friday for hikes with his dad and brother.

At family gatherings his parents danced, guests played and sang. Pouya started piano lessons at 8 and was soon improvising at the keyboard. He filled notebooks with tunes about his family, the nearby mountains, even the glowing embers in the fireplace. He put on concerts in the living room, hand printing the programmes and adjusting the lights to create just the right atmosphere. He and his brother played air guitar and drums, accompanying Nirvana, Pink Floyd and Radiohead on mixtapes brought home from school.

When Pouya was 12, the Hamidis left friends and family behind in Tehran, looking for a better life in Toronto. 

When he arrived in Canada Pouya didn’t speak a word of English. He studied piano and composition, enrolled in the Taylor Academy at the Royal Conservatory and brought home trophies from the Kiwanis Festival and the Canadian Music Competition. 

He explored the splendours of the public library and borrowed recordings – everything from Beethoven symphonies to hits by Bjork – with insatiable curiosity.

He also discovered the joy of collaborating with other musicians, whether he was playing with garage bands in high school or leading a 12-person progressive rock group. Pouya, who stuttered as a child, found music was an invaluable means of making social connections.

While pursuing a double major in composition and piano at the University of Toronto, he wrote film scores for independent movies.

He also completed McGill’s Masters of Sound Recording Program in Montreal. He loves working in the recording studio – a kind of sacred space where the magic of technology and human imagination combine to capture music forever. He’s worked on dozens of recordings, including Juno-nominated albums, with musicians across the country.

Pouya co-founded the  Ladom Ensemble in 2007, a quartet of fellow students at U of T. He’s Ladom’s resident composer and pianist. Their playlist of original music fuses Persian and Western classical traditions, blended with Argentinian tango, Serbian folk dance, progressive rock. They’ve toured all across Canada and have released two albums.

He also co-founded ICOT, a group of Iranian-Canadian composers who developed over 40 new works, ranging from opera and ballet to orchestral and vocal pieces. His music has been performed throughout North America.

“I’m in awe,” he says, “of the power and wonder of music. Collaborating, composing, sharing the stage with fellow musicians, feeding off their energy – it’s heaven on earth.”

Written by Denise Ball.