Conductor salutes renowned composer

As a conductor, Michael Massey always feels great joy in building a concert repertoire. However this time, as the Edmonton Youth Orchestra Winter Concert rolls around, there are a few bittersweet memories that will unfold.

The EYO concert held at the Winspear Centre tomorrow afternoon is, in fact, a salute to his old friend Dr. Malcolm Forsythe, an Edmonton-based award winning composer/conductor who passed away in July 2011 after a long battle with cancer.

For several decades, the two shared a deep love of music, long dinners at each other’s homes, fine wine and a common interest in gardening.

“He was a super intelligent, clever and thoughtful man. He was a giant and very influential. He had the appearance of being gruff, but he was really a pussycat inside. He was also genuine and great fun to be around. He had great stories of South Africa, where he came from, and he loved politics and current events,” says Massey.

The St. Albert resident has programmed several selections either written or reminiscent of Forsythe. First on the block is Forsythe’s composition Springtide performed by the 80-member Senior Orchestra.

Springtide was specifically written for the EYO and the orchestra premiered it in Banff in 1984 for a gathering of the now disbanded Canadian Association of Youth Orchestras.

“It’s the breaking out of spring and it shows a wonderful sense of colour and rhythmic challenges.”

A second work performed by the Senior Orchestra will be Franz Liszt’s Les Preludes, a work that embodies Forsythe’s spirit.

“It deals with life and the challenges of life. It’s from cradle to grave and it’s about overcoming life’s tribulations, which Malcolm did. It’s a wonderful symphonic work with the elements of earth, love, storms, a pastoral reconciliation and a big march at the end.”

The last piece dedicated to Forsythe is Czech composer Leos Janacek’s Taras Bulba.

“It’s a stark composition, but a great piece and it has to do with the challenges and triumphs of life.”

The Intermediate Orchestra performs Jean-Baptiste Lully’s Ballet Suite. A master of French Baroque, he composed this late Renaissance work as an interesting antiphonal discourse.

Also on their menu is American composer Charles Griffe’s The White Peacock, with its complex time signatures and Beethoven’s Overture to Egmont, a work not performed in several years.

“This is an eclectic concert with a variety of known and unknown masterpieces.”