Charleston Southern University Wind Ensemble
The Wind Ensemble at Charleston Southern is the select wind and percussion ensemble of the University. Membership is by audition or invitation, with students of any major permitted to audition. The Wind Ensemble performs the finest literature available for winds and percussion from the Renaissance through the 21st century, both as a large group and in woodwind, brass, percussion, and chamber ensembles. In addition to regular tours across the region, the Wind Ensemble recently presented an invited performance for the South Carolina Music Educators Association annual conference in Columbia. In May 2015, members of the Wind Ensemble performed in concert at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington D.C. and in February 2018, the ensemble performed at New York’s Carnegie Hall. Membership in the Wind Ensemble includes 62 students from all regions of South Carolina, as well as states from Michigan to Florida, and New Hampshire to Arizona.
Participated:
2016, 2018
Country:
USA
Conductor: Marshall Forrester
Dr. Marshall Forrester is Professor of Music and Director of Bands at Charleston Southern University where he conducts the Wind Ensemble and Orchestra, as well as teaching conducting and arranging. Dr. Forrester is the Founder and Director of the South Carolina Youth Wind Symphony and the Charleston Southern Summer Music Camp. He serves the CSU faculty as Chair of the Global Education Committee.
Dr. Forrester received the Master of Music degree, with a concentration in conducting, from the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester, where he studied wind ensemble history and literature with Donald Hunsberger, director emeritus of the renowned Eastman Wind Ensemble. He holds the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Music Education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Dr. Forrester is a graduate of the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in Durham.
Dr. Forrester was previously the Director of Bands at Carson-Newman University, where he conducted the Wind Ensemble and Symphonic Band, as well as teaching conducting and wind ensemble literature. He was the recipient of the Carson-Newman College Teaching Excellence and Leadership Award. During his time at Carson-Newman, Dr. Forrester accompanied five C-N students on a week-long residency and performance at New York’s Carnegie Hall. While in East Tennessee, he was the Music Director and Conductor of the Knoxville Wind Symphony. He was twice elected as College Representative on the Board of the East Tennessee School Band and Orchestra Association.
Dr. Forrester is active in the College Band Director’s National Association, and served as host for the CBDNA Southern Division Conference in Charleston in February 2016, during which he conducted the Charleston Wind Symphony in concert. Dr. Forrester’s university bands have performed by invitation at Tennessee All-State East, the South Carolina Music Educators Conference, CBDNA Southern Division, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, and on a 2016 tour of Europe that included performances at the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles conference in Prague, Czech Republic; the Mid-Europe Band Festival in Schladming, Austria; and San Marco Basilica in Venice, Italy. He maintains a busy schedule of adjudicating and guest conducting, having conducted members of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra in a series of grant-funded education concerts in the Charleston area, as well as guest conducting the Summerville Orchestra in a concert cycle featuring music by American composers. Dr. Forrester has presented wind music research internationally, previously lecturing for Die Internationale Gesellschaft zur Erforschung und Förderung der Blasmusik at the Konferenz 18 in Echternach, Luxembourg. He has also lectured and guest conducted on the wind music of Philip Sparke for the Southern Division of the College Band Directors National Association. He has several articles published in The Instrumentalist magazine.
Dr. Forrester enjoys computer programming as a hobby, having consulted on database design for education, performing arts, entertainment, aviation, and telecomm organizations in the USA, UK, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, and Sudan. He lives in Mount Pleasant with his wife, Lisa, sons, Paul and Andrew, and daughter, Katie.