Biography & Press

Margaret Thornhill is an artist/teacher of clarinet in Los Angeles who has performed as a clarinet soloist in the United States and Europe. She made her New York recital debut at Merkin Hall in 1982 and her UK debut at St. Martin-in-the-Fields in 1991. Critics have raved about her performances of the Mozart Concerto, K. 622 as “music of incomparable grace and almost unbearable poignance. Thornhill's performance was as loveable as Mozart was loving” (Peninsula Times-Tribune), of the Stravinsky Three Pieces as “Thornhill's musicality, technique, and control are extraordinary” (Palo Alto Times). John Rockwell, former lead music critic of the New York Times, called her performances of Rorem, Brahms, Levy and Berg a recital “nicely planned and nicely played.”

An avid chamber musician, Margaret was for ten years founder/director and clarinetist with the Matrix Chamber Ensemble, a Los Angeles-based 20th-century group which won numerous local, state and national grants and awards, was selected for the touring roster of the California Arts Council, and performed for Community Concerts. She has had repeated collaborations with members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and LA Opera Orchestras, the Armadillo Quartet, and studio recording artists, and was the clarinetist of “Category V,” a woodwind quintet with oboist David Kossoff, bassoonist John Campbell, hornist Nathan Campbell, and flutist Julie Long. She frequently performs as a duo with pianist Twyla Meyer, and performed and recorded in concert with the late pianist James Boyk. On historical clarinets, she performed and recorded for Centaur records with the Santa Cruz Baroque Festival, with the Los Angeles Baroque Orchestra at the Getty Museum, and with the chamber groups Divertimento and Clarion.

Margaret writes a regular column about clarinet choir literature for THE CLARINET, the journal of the International Clarinet Association, and has contributed articles on clarinet technique and pedagogy for British Clarinet and Saxophone and Australian Clarinet and Saxophone. Founding conductor of the Los Angeles Clarinet Choir, she has conducted them in performances at the International Clarinet Association ClarinetFests in 2007, 2010, 2011, 2017, and 2019, and in concerts at museums, libraries, churches, senior centers, and schools. In 2019, she also conducted the 101-member participant choir at ClarinetFest19, in Knoxville, Tennessee.

A native of California, Margaret Thornhill holds degrees from the University of California and Stanford University, where she earned a DMA in performance practice. Her principal clarinet teacher was the legendary Rosario Mazzeo, with whom she studied for nine years and was his assistant for two. She also studied with Leon Russianoff, of the Juilliard School, with David Breeden, late principal of the San Francisco Symphony, and historical clarinet with Colin Lawson, now head of the Royal College of Music.

Margaret is a former member of the faculty at UC Santa Cruz and Stanford University, and was for five years assistant professor of instrumental music at Occidental College. She was adjunct professor of clarinet at Concordia University Irvine from 2008 to 2022, and adjunct professor of clarinet at Claremont Graduate University beginning in 2021. Margaret also teaches advanced students privately at her home studio in Venice. She has been a chamber music coach for Chamber Musicians of Northern California since 2007, and was the clarinet chamber music coach for the Ashland Chamber Music Workshop at Southern Oregon University from 2015-2019. From 2006-2017, she was founder and master teacher of the Claremont Clarinet Festival, a week-long workshop for advanced adult clarinetists held annually as a summer conference at Pomona College. In 2022, she was the lead woodwind coach at the Humboldt Chamber Music Workshop at Cal Poly Humboldt.