Horst Förster

Horst Förster (13 March 1920 – 30 June 1986) was a German conductor, choirmaster, violinist and university teacher. In 1952, he was appointed the youngest General Music Director of the GDR in the . Afterwards, he was chief conductor of the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Halle and the (1956–1964) as well as the Dresden Philharmonic (1964–1966), and of Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra from 1985-1986.

Early life and education Förster was born in 1920 in Dresden, the son of Willibald Förster and his wife Martha Ziesche. From 1936 to 1940, he underwent his musical training at the orchestral school of the Staatskapelle Dresden. (piano, theory and composition), Kurt Striegler (conducting) and Alfred Stier (choral conducting). In 1947, he founded a chamber orchestra there,

He then went to the Landestheater Eisenach in Thuringia. On 1 January 1951, he succeeded Peter Schmitz Director of the . In 1952, he was appointed as the youngest General Music Director of the GDR at the time. According to Gilbert Stöck, he struck "a rather independent path in the programme conception" in the Saale city, which met with criticism in the . In coordination with the Halle-Magdeburg ('VDK'), he founded the contemporary music series "Musica Viva" in the 1956/57 season, in which works by living composers from the region were to be performed. Thus, as late as 1956, on the occasion of the Hallische Musiktage, which he had helped to initiate, Walter Draeger's Violin Concerto. Afterwards, "[Förster] adapted to certain political guidelines", aiming at "ensuring quality in performances of contemporary music" without having sustainably promoted composers of the region, Stöck says. He also appeared with a Mozart-Beethoven-Schumann cycle as guest conductor with the Konzerthausorchester Berlin. Repeatedly he was invited abroad, for example in 1963 he gave guest performances with the Riga Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic in the Soviet Union. A year later he conducted the National Philharmonic in Warsaw.

From September 1964 to 1966, he was principal conductor of the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra. After Förster had been criticised by the state in Halle for his too Western repertoire, he tried to serve more composers from Eastern Europe in Dresden. the concerto for piano (with Annerose Schmidt) and the Symphonic Concerto by Gerhard Rosenfeld as well as the cantatas Eros by Fidelio F. Finke and Schir Haschirim by Rudolf Wagner-Régeny on the premiere.

In 1957, he received a teaching assignment and in 1961 a professorship at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler". Together with Bongartz, he undertook an extended orchestral concert tour to West Germany in the same year. More and more, however, Förster's strength dwindled due to illness. Förster's successor in leading the Dresden Philharmonic was Kurt Masur.

Förster died in Dresden at the age of 66.

Personal life From 1943 he was married to Liesbeth Förster, née Schuriczek. Christoph Rink: Chronologie des Händelpreises. In Mitteilungen des Freundes- und Förderkreises des Händel-Hauses zu Halle e.V. 1/2012, , here . 1963: Patriotic Order of Merit in Bronze ("In recognition of outstanding services in the cultural field").