1964 in Canadian music

Births

 * 18 January – Jim Matt, country music singer.
 * 18 January – Patrick Esposito Di Napoli, member of Les Colocs (d.1994).
 * 25 January – Andrew MacNaughtan, photographer and music video director (d.2012).
 * 30 January – Patricia Conroy, country music singer.
 * 1 February – Dwayne Goettel, former member of Skinny Puppy (d.1995).
 * 6 February – Gordon Downie, lead singer and lyricist for The Tragically Hip.
 * 8 March – Denise Murray, country music singer.
 * 8 June – Mark Howard, audio engineer.
 * 17 August – Colin James, Juno Award-winning singer-songwriter, and guitarist.
 * 12 September – Greg McConnell, indie rocker and member of Absolute Whores (d.1999).
 * 16 November – Diana Krall, Grammy and Juno Awards winning jazz musician.
 * 29 November – Jesse Cook, Juno Award-winning guitarist.
 * 30 November – Edwin Orion Brownell, neo-classical composer and concert pianist.
 * 7 December – Kyp Harness, folk singer and social activist.


 * Full date unknown
 * Charest, Benoît, guitarist and film score composer.
 * Danna, Jeff, film score composer
 * Lee, Brent, composer and professor of Music Composition at the University of Windsor.
 * Ichkhanian, Levon, jazz composer and guitarist

Albums released

 * Lorne Greene, The Man

Awards

 * 28 December, the 1st RPM Awards are announced.

Festivals

 * Mariposa Folk Festival was held at the Maple Leaf Stadium
 * Miramichi Folksong Festival
 * Montreal Festivals

Magazines and publications

 * 24 February – RPM publishes first issue.

Music groups

 * Bands formed
 * 3's a Crowd (band)
 * Chai Folk Ensemble
 * Jack London & The Sparrows
 * The Mynah Birds


 * Bands disbanded
 * CBC Symphony Orchestra
 * The Crew-Cuts

Organisations

 * Alberta Music Festival Association is established to coordinate local music competition.

Singles released

 * "My Baby's Comin' Home" by Paul Anka

Songs

 * Early Morning Rain, composed and recorded by Gordon Lightfoot.
 * Mon Pays ("My Homeland") composed by Gilles Vigneault.
 * Universal Soldier (song), written and recorded Buffy Sainte-Marie.
 * You Were on My Mind, written by Sylvia Tyson.

Venues

 * The Matador Club, a country-music venue, opens in Toronto.

Other

 * 10 April – Glenn Gould retires from public performance in Los Angeles.

Deaths

 * 7 January – Colin McPhee, composer and musicologist.
 * 9 September – Charles O'Neill, bandmaster, composer, organist, cornetist, and music educator.
 * 24 November – Georges-Émile Tanguay, composer, organist, pianist, and music educator.
 * 27 December – Pierre-Aurèle Asselin, tenor singer, brother to Marie-Anne Asselin.