Owen Watkins

Owen has performed on baroque oboe, recorder and early clarinet with many period instrument ensembles in the United States including Boston Baroque, Boston Camerata, Handel and Haydn Society, Washington Bach Consort, Arcadia Players, Ars Lyrica Houston, Opera Lafayette, and the Four Nations ensemble. A graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium, Owen studied recorder at Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam with Walter van Hauwe and Boston University where he graduated with a master’s degree in baroque oboe.

In conjunction with a performing career Owen has worked as an instrument maker with Von Huene Workshop for eight years, making recorders, collaborating with Joel Robinson in New York City on historical clarinet and basset horn. During 2014 and 2015 he was woodturner at Morgan Recorders in Daylesford, Victoria, before working for five years as an instrument technician at Sax and Woodwind in Sydney. Owen currently runs his own workshop in Dover, New Hampshire, where he repairs antique and modern woodwinds and makes baroque oboes based on an original instrument by I W Kenigsperger in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.