Madeleine Forte began her career at a Beethoven festival in Vichy, France. La Montagne wrote of her debut: "A new star has risen in the firmament of artistic glory. A young girl, age 13, played with great brio Beethoven's Appassionata, so that the audience stood and gave a lengthy ovation." She first studied piano with her aunt, then with master pianists Alfred Cortot and Wilhelm Kempff. She has won prizes in international competitions (Viotti, Italy; Maria Canals, Spain; Guanabara, Brazil).
She holds an Artist Diploma from the Warsaw Conservatory in the class of Zbigniew Drzewiecki and bachelors and masters degrees from The Juilliard School, where she studied with Rosina Lhevinne and Martin Canin. In 1984 she received the Ph.D. degree from New York University with a dissertation on the music of Olivier Messiaen. She is a recipient of the Master Teacher Certificate, Music Teachers National Association. She is a Fellow of Silliman College, Yale University.

Madeleine Forte has appeared as a recording artist on Radiodiffusion-television franaise in Paris, on Radio Warsaw, on Television O Globo, Rio-de-Janeiro, Radio Television Buenos Aires, and NBC Television, New York. She has presented solo recitals and has performed as a soloist with orchestras in France, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Poland, Estonia, Hungary, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Austria, England, Norway, the United States , Canada, and China. Her compact disc recordings of the music of Ravel, Debussy, Messiaen, Chopin (2), and Barber are distributed and have attracted attention worldwide.

Mme. Forte is Professor Emerita of Piano at the Morrison Center for the Performing Arts, and has given lectures and master classes at many colleges and universities in the United States and abroad. She is the author of several publications, including the book Olivier Messiaen, the Musical Mediator. Madeleine Forte resides in Connecticut with her husband Allen Forte, Battell Professor of Music Theory, Emeritus, at Yale University and Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.