He has won several international and national awards, including First Prize in the 1984 CBC Competition for Young Composers.
His chamber opera, Elsewhereless, a collaboration with Atom Egoyan, premiered in 1998 and has been staged 35 times internationally.
Sharman studied under Murray Adaskin, Rudolf Komorous, Brian Ferneyhough, Morton Feldman, David Felder, Frederic Rzewski, Louis Andriessen and Lucas Foss.
The Canadian Section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) elected him President from 1991-95.
In 1990, Sharman was awarded the Kranichsteiner Music Prize at the Darmstadt summer courses in Germany.