Short Bio

Awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal for outstanding service to the Province in the field of arts and culture and expanding the reach of the arts in Alberta in 2023, and recognized with a Alberta Emerging Artist Award by the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta in 2020, Carlos Foggin is the Founder and Music Director Laureate of the Rocky Mountain Symphony Orchestra, leading the ensemble from its founding in 2016 to his retirement in May 2025.

In February 2025, he was honoured with the Professional Artist Award at the Mayor’s Night of the Arts (Airdrie, AB). In 2024, the RMSO was honoured to be named the “Community Ensemble of the Year” at the 2024 YYCMusicAwards (Calgary, AB).

Mr. Foggin is a Fellow of the Royal Canadian College of Organists, only the 100th organist to be recognized with the Society’s highest honour since 1909.

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Honours & Awards

  • 2025 Music’s Future Scholar (The Recording Industry’s Music Performance Trust Fund)

  • 2025 Classical Recording of the Year | Producer (YYC Music Awards)

  • 2025 Professional Artist of the Year (Airdrie Mayor’s Night of the Arts)

  • 2024 Community Ensemble of the Year | Director (YYC Music Awards)

  • 2023 Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal (LGA: Salma Lakhani)

  • 2020 Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Emerging Artist (LGA: Lois Mitchell)

  • 2019 Compelling Calgarian (Calgary Herald)

  • 2016 Fellow, Royal Canadian College of Organists (FRCCO)

Nominations

  • 2025 YYC Music Awards Community Ensemble of the Year

  • 2023 YYC Music Awards Community Ensemble of the Year

  • 2022 RBC Emerging Artist Award

  • 2021 Rozsa Foundation Emerging Arts Administrator Award

  • 2020 Alberta Artist in Residence & Arts Ambassador

  • 2018 Avenue Magazine Top 40 under 40

Scholarships & Prizes

  • The Clifford McAree Scholarship (RCCO) | 2025

  • Professor Allan Gordon Bell Distinguished Faculty Achievement Graduate Scholarship in Music (UofC) | 2025

  • Norman Kennedy Graduate Scholarship (UofC) | 2024

  • The Willan Prize 2016
    For highest marks in national exams (FRCCO)

  • The Heather Spry Prize 2016
    For highest marks in written examination (FRCCO)

  • The Doreen Porter Prize 2016
    For highest marks in practical examination (FRCCO)

  • Anthony G. Petti Scholarship in Music (UofC) 2015

  • F.L. Fenwick Scholarship in Music (UofC) 2013 | 2014 | 2015

  • Jason Lang Scholarship (UofC) 2014 | 2015

  • The Willan Prize 2013
    For highest marks in national exams (ARCCO)

  • The Rollinson Prize 2013
    For highest marks in written examination (ARCCO)

  • The Ruth & Ralph Barker Prize 2013
    For highest marks in practical examination (ARCCO)

  • The Kathleen Williams Prize 2008
    For highest marks in national exams (CRCCO)

Awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal for outstanding service to the Province in the field of arts and culture and expanding the reach of the arts in Alberta in 2023, and formerly recognized with a Alberta Emerging Artist Award by the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta in 2020, Carlos Foggin is the Founder & Music Director Laureate of the Rocky Mountain Symphony Orchestra, serving as Music Director from 2016-2025, collaborating with esteemed soloists such as James Campbell CM, Glen Montgomery, Stephen Nguyen, Magdalena von Eccher, and Kathleen van Mourik, to name a few. He has performed live and in concert on CBC radio, and can be heard on numerous commercial recordings.

In March 2025, his 13-movement composition Litaniae Sancti Joseph received its premiere at the Jack Singer Concert Hall in Calgary, AB in the presence of three Bishops (Archbishop Ivan Jurkovič Apostolic Nuncio to Canada, Bishop William T. McGratton Diocese of Calgary, Bishop Gregory J. Bittman Diocese of Nelson BC). Commissioned by God Squad Canada/Heroic Men, this work is is the first-ever large-scale choral/orchestral setting of this text.

Only the 100th organist inducted as a Fellow of the Royal Canadian College of Organists (the highest honour from Canada’s oldest musician’s guild), and a celebrated recitalist & improviser, Mr. Foggin has been blessed to concertize around the globe on some of the world’s greatest instruments. Performance venues include hundreds of concert halls and churches including Notre Dame de Paris, St. Patrick’s Cathedral (NYC), Oratoire Saint-Joseph-du-Mont-Royal (Montreal), and Westminster Abbey.

As a pianist, Mr Foggin has performed alongside notable popular acts, Il Divo, Michael Bublé, Josh Groban, and The Canadian Tenors, to name a few. He has arranged music for and performed with British Military Bands including the Band of the Scots Guards and the Band of the Royal Parachute Regiment.

Raised in a small farming community in southern Alberta, Mr. Foggin is proud to be a Chief Scout, a Queen’s Venture, and a recipient of the Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award.