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A dedicated church musician, STUART FORSTER is well known as organ soloist and accompanist, as
well as conductor, teacher, choral trainer, organ consultant, composer, and arranger. He has been Director of Music and Organist
at Christ
Church, Cambridge, Massachusetts, since 1999, where he was appointed at the age of 27.
At Christ Church,
Mr. Forster directs three choirs (Adult, Youth, and Evensong), provides the liturgical accompaniment, and carries out the
administration, pastoral work, and organization required to build the music program and related areas of the parish. Before
his appointment at Christ Church, he frequently
acted as consultant to churches facing the choice between rebuilding their old organ and installing a new one, experience
that proved of great benefit to Christ Church
in the process leading to the decision to commission the new Schoenstein organ.
Since arriving at Christ Church, Mr. Forster has composed more than seventy arrangements of hymns and anthems,
a congregational setting of the mass, and several original anthems, hymn tunes, and psalm chants. Publishers and reviewers
are responding to these with enthusiasm. He also teaches organ performance and accompaniment, and his current students range
from a choir school graduate to scholars at Harvard University.
Mr. Forster maintains a rigorous concert career throughout both hemispheres, and works regularly
with such organizations as The American Guild of Organists and The Royal School of Church Music. He has served as co-Chair
of the Young Organists’ Initiative, which promotes organ-playing by gifted young musicians, and as a member of various
Executive Committees. In New South Wales, Australia,
he was the editor of Newsclef, the newsletter of the local branch of the Royal School of Church Music Australia.
Professional journals regularly feature articles both by and about Mr. Forster. Original
research informs his article, “The Application of the Barnes Tempering System to the Organ Works of J.S. Bach,”
which was published in The Sydney Organ Journal (1996), and he contributed to the feature article about the new Schoenstein
organ at Christ Church, which was published in The American Organist (January 2007).
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His landmark organ transcription of Dvořák’s Ninth Symphony, “From the New World,”
was published by Éditions Chantraine of Belgium; Paraclete Press recently published his choral motet O taste and see.
Mr. Forster’s recordings include a CD on JAV Recordings #113 (including the Dvořák symphony) in the “Great
Organ Builders of America” series, and regular radio broadcasts throughout Australia and the United States; his most
recent recording is the CD “Symphonic Quest,” released on the Pro Organo label, featuring new orchestral transcriptions
of his own and organ music performed on the large Schoenstein organ in Lincoln, Nebraska.
As Organ Scholar at St. James’ Anglican Church, Sydney, Mr. Forster developed his liturgical
accompaniment skills under the guidance of Peter Jewkes and Walter Sutcliffe. After arriving in the United States
in 1996, Mr. Forster worked with Robert Lehman as Fellow in Church Music at Christ
Church, New Haven, Connecticut;
he served concurrently at Yale University
as accompanist to various choruses and graduate courses, teacher to numerous undergraduate and secondary organ students, and
organist to the interdenominational Marquand Chapel at Yale
Divinity School.
As an undergraduate, Mr. Forster studied organ with David Rumsey
at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, with teaching supplemented by Rosemary Blake, Philip Swanton, and Amy Johansen. In
post-graduate study with Thomas Murray and Martin Jean, for which he was awarded full scholarships, Mr. Forster earned two
degrees from Yale University, the Faculty Prize from the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, and the Julia R. Sherman Prize for
excellence in organ playing. Other study has included
musical styles from plainsong to jazz, conducting and voice, and a degree in Economics at the University of Sydney.
Mr. Forster is a Fellow of Trinity College of Music, London; other
scholarships that he has held include the University of Sydney Organ Scholarship (awarded twice), the Alice Bryant Organ Scholarship (for two
terms of three years each), the Ruth and Paul Manz Organ Scholarship, and the Robert S. Baker Scholarship. He is a recipient
of the coveted Scarf Foundation Award, and was the winner of the 1994 Sydney International Organ Competition.
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