Robert Bruce

Robert Richard Fernie Bruce (17 August 1915 – 13 August 2012) was a composer, lecturer and a decorated Flight Lieutenant during the WWII. He was the great grandson of James Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin and 12th Earl of Kincardine and was born on 17 August 1915 in Inverkeilor, a village and parish in Angus, Scotland.

He was educated at Rugby School, before enrolling in 1935 at University of Edinburgh. His professor was Donald Tovey, a British musical analyst, musicologist, writer on music, composer, conductor and pianist. Bruce graduated in 1938. He then studied with Julius Röntgen, a German-Dutch composer of classical music, in Amsterdam. first performed by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and recorded in 1999 by the Częstochowa Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by . Symphony in B flat is dedicated to Bannock and in part inspired by the night sorties they flew together.

His wife died in 2010, and he is survived by a son and a daughter, Katharine and James; an elder son, Richard, predeceased him in death in 2007. Robert Bruce died on 13 August 2012.