Alexander Brott
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Alexander Brott, born Joël Brod, (March 14, 1915 – April 1, 2005), was a Canadian conductor, composer, violinist and music teacher.
Brott's wife, Lotte, was an accomplished cellist, his son Boris Brott is a conductor and his son Denis Brott is a cellist and conductor.
Brott was born in Montreal, and was leader of the Montreal Orchestra, Les Concerts symphoniques de Montréal and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra from 1945 to 1958. In 1939, he joined the Faculty of Music at McGill University, where he remained until 1980. His compositions included Arabesque, Circle, Triangle, 4 Squares, and Paraphrase in Polyphony. He was also the founder and musical director of the McGill Chamber Orchestra. He also conducted the Kingston Symphony Orchestra from 1965 to 1981.
In 1979 he was made a Member of the Order of Canada and in 1988 he was made a Knight of the National Order of Quebec. His entertaining memoirs, "Alexander Brott: My Lives in Music" (with co-writer Betty Nygaard King), were published by Mosaic Press in 2005.
He died in Montreal at the age of 90.