Don Thompson Wins the 2026 Louis Applebaum Composers Award for His Jazz Work

Don Thompson, the Canadian multi-instrumentalist, composer and educator, has received the 2026 Louis Applebaum Composers Award. The Ontario Arts Foundation announced the prize in Toronto on Tuesday, Oct. 20. The award carries $15,000 and this year recognizes excellence for a body of work in the field of jazz.

According to the foundation, Thompson's career spans more than six decades as a leader, co-leader and sideman on hundreds of recordings. He first gained prominence in the 1960s with the John Handy Quintet, including a performance at Carnegie Hall, and went on to become a fixture of the Canadian and international jazz scenes. The announcement lists his collaborations with Rob McConnell's Boss Brass, Moe Koffman, Jim Hall and George Shearing, and singles out his work with guitarist Sonny Greenwich and trumpeter Kenny Wheeler.

As a composer, the foundation says, Thompson has written dozens of recorded works, from jazz ensemble pieces to commissions for string quartets and for classical bassists such as Joel Quarrington. He has also taught for decades at institutions including the Banff Centre, Humber College and York University. His earlier honors include three Juno Awards, the Oscar Peterson Award and the Canadian Jazz Masters Award, and he was named an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2009. He continues to record; his most recent collaborative album, Dreams, came out in 2025, with Thompson on piano alongside singer Daniela Spalletta, bassist Roberto Occhipinti and guitarist Reg Schwager.

The jury that chose him was made up of Toronto pianist and composer Hilario Durán, who won the Applebaum award in 2018; Toronto percussionist, vibraphonist and composer Racha Moukalled; and Ottawa singer, composer and educator Diane Nalini. In their comments, the assessors called Thompson "a musical national treasure" whose compositions "have been influential across generations," adding that "he is the root of the jazz tree."

The Louis Applebaum Composers Fund was set up at the Ontario Arts Foundation in 1998 by the Canadian composer Louis Applebaum. The award is given every two years and rotates among four fields: media; theatre, music theatre, dance or opera; jazz; and composition for young people. The foundation manages the endowment that pays for the award, while the Ontario Arts Council runs the nomination and adjudication process. Recent recipients in the other fields include Cecilia Livingston (2024), Debashis Sinha (2022) and Eleanor Daley (2020).

For big band listeners, the Boss Brass connection is a reminder of how much of Thompson's playing has been heard inside large ensembles, even as his best-known partnerships, with Greenwich and Wheeler, came in smaller groups.