Education and professional life

Born in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, Tilney studied music and modern languages at Cambridge University, studied harpsichord with Mary Potts at Kings College, Cambridge, and became a student of Gustav Leonhardt

Gustav Leonhardt

Gustav Leonhardt is a highly renowned Dutch keyboard player, conductor, musicologist, teacher and editor. Leonhardt has been a leading figure in the movement to perform music on period instruments...

. After graduation at Cambridge he spent several years as an opera coach and piano accompanist at Sadler's Wells Theatre

Sadler's Wells Theatre

Sadler's Wells Theatre is a performing arts venue located in Rosebery Avenue, Clerkenwell in the London Borough of Islington. The present day theatre is the sixth on the site since 1683. It consists of two performance spaces: a 1,500 seat main auditorium and the Lilian Baylis Studio, with extensive...

 and the New Opera Company, following which he focused his energies on teaching and performing on early keyboard instruments. In 1964 he was the harpsichordist under the direction of Igor Stravinski for the original Columbia recording of The Rake's Progress

The Rake's Progress

The Rake's Progress is an opera in three acts and an epilogue by Igor Stravinsky. The libretto, written by W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman, is based loosely on the eight paintings and engravings A Rake's Progress of William Hogarth, which Stravinsky had seen on May 2, 1947, in a Chicago...

.

Life and work in Canada

In 1979 Tilney moved to Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 and settled in Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

, where he continued to teach privately and at the Royal Conservatory of Music

Royal Conservatory of Music

The Royal Conservatory of Music is a music school and performance venue in Toronto, Canada. Other uses of the term include:*The Madrid Royal Conservatory, Spain*The Royal Academy of Music, London, United Kingdom...

. He performed with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and the Toronto Consort, as well as touring to Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

 and Great Britain

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

. In 1985 he formed the chamber ensemble Les Coucous Bénévoles, which regularly commissions new music by Canadian composers. He taught for several seasons at the Dartington Summer Festival in Totnes

Totnes

Totnes is a market town and civil parish at the head of the estuary of the River Dart in Devon, England within the South Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty...

, England. He has been recorded for radio broadcast by the BBC and CBC

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...

, which has issued CDs of his performances. In 2002 Tilney moved to Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, Canada and is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific coast. The city has a population of about 78,000 within the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria, which has a population of 360,063, the 15th most populous Canadian...

, where he continues to teach and perform.

Performance philosophy

Tilney is well known for his historically informed approach to performance practice, performing on antique instruments or instruments based on antiques, using largely original music sources.

Works

Tilney’s contributions to literature include The Art of the Unmeasured Prelude: France 1660 to 1720 (Schott's, London, 1991), and previously unpublished harpsichord music by Antoine Forqueray

Antoine Forqueray

Antoine Forqueray was a French composer and virtuoso of the viola da gamba.Forqueray, born in Paris, was the first in a line of composers who included his brother Michel and his sons Jean-Baptiste and Nicolas Gilles...

 (Heugel, 1970).

Tilney has a long discography of harpsichord and fortepiano performances from labels including Dorian, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, Oiseau-Lyre, EMI Reflexe, Nonesuch

Nonesuch Records

Nonesuch Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Records.-Company history:Nonesuch was founded in 1964 by Jac Holzman to produce "fine records at the same price as a trade paperback", which would be half the price of a normal LP...

, Vangard, DoReMi and several others.

Sources

• Bach Cantatas