In the late 1950s, Forte taught music at various New York institutions: Columbia University Teachers College, Manhattan School of Music, and Mannes College of Music. In fall 1959 he began his long-term appointment at Yale, where he eventually became the Battell Professor of Music. He was influential there as both scholar and teacher, and in the latter capacity served as advisor to seventy-two Ph.D. dissertations completed between 1968 and 2002. A list of all his advisees and their dissertation titles appears in . The list is ordered chronologically by submission, and each advisee is given an "FA" number to denote his or her ordering among the advisees.
Publications
Forte is well known for his book , which traces many of its roots to an article of a decade earlier: "A Theory of Set-Complexes for Music". In these works, he "applied set-theoretic principles to the analysis of unordered collections of pitch classes, called pitch-class sets. The basic goal of Forte's theory was to define the various relationships that existed among the relevant sets of a work, so that contextual coherence could be demonstrated." Although the methodology derived from Forte’s work "has had its detractors... textbooks on post-tonal analysis now routinely teach it." Forte published analyses of the works of Webern and Berg and wrote about Schenkerian analysis and music of the Great American Songbook. A complete, annotated bibliography of his publications appears in the previously cited article, Excluding items only edited by Forte, it lists ten books, sixty-three articles, and thirty-six other types publications, from 1955 through early 2009 Forte was also the editor of the Journal of Music Theory during an important period in its development, from volume 4/2 through 11/1. His involvement with the journal, including many biographical details, is addressed in David Carson Berry, "Journal of Music Theory under Allen Forte's Editorship," Journal of Music Theory 50/1 : 7-23.
Honors and awards
He has been honored by two Festschriften. The first, in commemoration of his seventieth birthday, was published in 1997 and edited by his former students James M. Baker, David W. Beach, and Jonathan W. Bernard. It was titled '. The second was serialized in five installments of ', between 2009 and 2013. It was edited by Forte's former student David Carson Berry and was titled . It included twenty-two articles by Forte's former doctoral advisees, and three special features: a previously unpublished article by Forte, on Gershwin songs; a collection of tributes and reminiscences from forty-two of his former advisees; and an annotated register of his publications and advisees.
Personal life
Forte was married to the French-born pianist , emerita professor of piano at Boise State University.
