Ellis McLintock

McLintock, Ellis (Lee)

Ellis (Lee) McLintock. Trumpeter, conductor, arranger, b Toronto 18 Nov 1921, d Stratford, Ont, 25 Sep 1997. McLintock studied cornet with his father, Ellis, and trumpet with A.J. Williams. In 1936, McLintock placed first in the audition for the Canadian contingent of the British Empire Boys' Band, and toured England for two months. After his return to Canada, he won an RCM scholarship. The Toronto Philharmonic Orchestra made him fourth trumpet in 1937, and the following year, while still a high-school student, he joined the TSO as principal trumpet and simultaneously held the same position with the RCM and the University of Toronto. He also began to be heard on radio at that time.

McLintock undertook further studies in New York in 1940 and 1941 with Ernest Williams. He toured in 1941 throughout North America as a member of the All-American Youth Orchestra under Stokowski, then served as soloist with the Central Band of the RCAF in Ottawa. McLintock was principal trumpet 1944-5 again of the TSO and 1952-63 of the CBC Symphony Orchestra, and also played in CBC radio orchestras under Lucio Agostini, Jack Kane, Bert Niosi, and others. He led his own dance band (Ellis McLintock, His Trumpet and Orchestra) 1944-50 in Toronto (Casa Loma, Palais Royale), Montreal (Belmont Park), and Peterborough, Muskoka, and Burlington, Ont; the band ranked as one of the leading Toronto groups of the swing era. McLintock began playing for television shows in the 1950s and 1960s, such as The Wayne and Shuster Show, Cross Canada Hit Parade, and The Music Makers, and worked at Stratford's Festival Theatre under Louis Applebaum. During the 1960s he again led a dance band (Old Mill, Toronto), established the Ellis McLintock Concert Band, and was music director for the Community Folk Art Council of Canada (which presented the annual "Nationbuilders - Canada "at the CNE Grandstand) and of the Canadian Pavilion Concert Band at Expo 67.

In later years, after cancer surgery left him unable to play his instrument at the same level, he taught high-school music, first in Thornhill, Ont, and then in Orillia, Ont, retiring after 1986 to Delhi, Ont. He and his second wife, Erna, moved to Stratford, Ont, around 1993. McLintock was named 1994 Musician of Distinction by the Toronto Musicians' Association.

McLintock is heard as conductor and performer on the LPs At the Old Mill (1962, RCA Camden CAS-967), Trumpets-A-Plenty (1964, CTL CTLS-5054), Ellis McLintock, His Trumpet and Orchestra (1965, CTL CTLS-5070), and Canadian Pavilion Concert Band (1967, RCI 232/RCA PCS-1179).