Gil Trythall

Harry Gilbert Trythall (October 28, 1930 – February 17, 2023) was an American composer, electronic music pioneer, keyboardist, pianist of jazz and contemporary classical music, a life long educator, and a multimedia enthusiast. He often collaborated with artists (notably Prof. Don Evans (Vanderbilt-Nashville) to create engrossing public experiences. Dr. Trythall founded the Electronic Music Plus Festival in the late 1960s and hosted events at universities across the United States. As a musician, Trythall is best known for his experiments and compositions in electronic music. For instance, "Planet" by Four Tet and "myriad.industries" by Oneohtrix Point Never sample his 1980 compositions "Echospace" and "Luxicon II". As a twentieth century composer of both traditional and electronic works, Gilbert Trythall combined the large scale sonorities reminiscent of Paul Hindemith and Wallingford Riegger with the expanded capabilities of both electronic and conventional instruments. His Symphony No. 1 (1958) is a demanding work for large orchestra, and his Hecuba and Polyxena of the same period is a severe, brilliant twelve-tone work. Beginning with the Moog synthesizer in the early 1960s, Trythall made increasing use of electronic and computerized resources and in the 1990s taught composition to students worldwide via his own Internet site from West Virginia University. Following his retirement in 1999, Trythall embarked upon a two-year program to develop courses in music and composition in Brazil. Trythall's works are archived in the University of Tennessee's Music College.