Forsyth

Malcolm Forsyth was born and educated in South Africa before settling in Canada in 1968 where he became a faculty member of the University of Alberta in Edmonton.He studied at the University of Cape Town. Majoring initially in trombone, later, in his Masters’ and Doctoral degrees, in conducting and composition. His teachers included Erik Chisholm, Stanley Glasser, Stefans Grove and Georg Tintner. After spending eight years in the trombone section of the Cape Town Symphony Orchestra, where he experienced the conducting of the likes of Constantin Silvestri, Edgar Cosma and Igor Stravinsky, and after obtaining the Masters’ degree in musicology, he decided to emigrate. A year in Toronto saw him, among other things, working as a teacher in the school system and leading a CBC studio trombone ensemble. Later he obtained the Doctoral degree and also studied conducting in England under George Hurst. At the University of Alberta he taught theory, composition, conducting and (for the first fourteen years) trombone and held the position of Composer-in-Residence and conductor of the University Symphony Orchestra. He was also a member of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra for eleven years, three as bass trombone and eight as principal.It is his work as a composer which has brought his name to international attention, however. Having been commissioned by the likes of Maureen Forrester, the Canadian Brass, Judith Forst, Helmut Brauss, the Blaserensemble Mainz and the Symphony Orchestras of Montreal, Edmonton, Cape Town and the Natal Philharmonic has enabled his music to be heard on six continents while his catalogue has expanded to over one-hundred-and-forty titles, including three symphonies, twelve other orchestral works, thirteen for soloists and orchestra, four for band, forty-seven for chamber groups of various types, ten vocal works and three for solo piano.