Fall convocation honorees

Fall convocation honorees

Adrienne Clarkson
Honorary Doctor of Letters

A celebrated concert organist, Marie-Claire Alain has toured worldwide and drawn rave reviews from music critics. She has recorded over 200 LP albums and more than 60 CDs, covering the works of such composers as Bach and Mendelssohn. She has won many awards, including 15 Grands Prix du Disque.

Alain is also widely respected as a teacher. She is in charge of the "cycle de formation professionnelle" for organists at the Conservatoire National de Région de Paris and probably no organ teacher has produced as many prize-winning students at international competitions.

Her most recent work focuses on the legacy of her brother, Jehan Alain, one of the world's most accomplished organ musicians until his untimely death in 1940.

Alain has been named a member of the Swedish Royal Academy of Music. The city of Lübeck granted her the Buxtehude Prize in recognition of her work promoting early German music and the city of Budapest awarded her the Franz Liszt Prize. In her native France, she is a commander of the Légion d'honneur and a member of the Ordre National du Mérite and of the Ordre National des Arts et Lettres.