Eric Whitacre

•By: Kody Harvey

•Music 1010

Biography• Born January 2, 1970 in Reno,

Nevada

• Joined college choir at UNLV in Las

Vegas

• Continued to Julliard to earn Master of

Music

• Married Hila Plitmann (Grammy

winning soprano) and has 1 son

• Currently lives in London

• 42 Years old

• First composition: Go, Lovely, Rose (Completed at age 21)

• Conducts for many famous orchestras/choirs

• London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus

• Chanticleer

• Philharmonia Orchestra

• Has 26 compositions in SATB choral style alone

• Also writes for wind symphonies, solo voice, musical theatre, opera, etc.

• Sets poems from Dickinson, Cummings, etc for choral pieces

•Selects one of his compositions and gives to score away on Youtube/his

blog.•People record themselves singing to a video of him conducting the piece.

•Puts all the videos together•Posts it !

Virtual Choir 1: Lux Aurumque•3 million views

•185 singers from 12 countriesVirtual Choir 2.0: Sleep

•2,000 voices from 58 countriesVirtual Choir 3

•3,746 voices from 73 countries

Composition History

•Composing works since he attended UNLV

•First major work was written for a class

•Often uses poems or short stories as lyrics

Cloudburst•Published in 1995

•Text from an Octavio Paz poem

•Written for a high school choir

•Adapted a campfire game of finger snapping

to simulate rain•Used large sheets of tin

for sounds of thunder•Originally 10 minutes

long

•Performed at UNAM, where Octavio Paz studied, in 2009

•In Native language

Go, Lovely Rose• Poem by Edmund Waller in

17th century

• Set to music for Whitacre’s

choir teacher at UNLV, David

Weiller

• Performed in 1991

• Performed in ACDA

convention in Hawaii in 1992

• After performance, Barbara

Harlow published it with two

other flower poems he set to

music

“Go, lovely rose

Tell her that wastes her time and me,

That now she knows,

When I resemble her to thee,

How sweet and fair she seems to be.

Tell her that’s young,

And shuns to have her graces spied,

That hadst thou sprung

In deserts where no men abide,

Thou must have uncommended died.

Small is the worth

Of beauty from the light retired;

Bid her come forth,

Suffer herself to be desired,

And not blush so to be admired.

Then die! That she

The common fate of all things rare

May read in thee;

How small a part of time they share,

That are so wondrous sweet and fair!

Edmund Waller, 1606-1687”

Listening Guide•Cloudburst

•Originally 10 min

•Written for Dr. Jocelyn K. Jensen

Listening Guide

•Go, Lovely Rose

•Poem by Edmund Waller

•Set to music while at UNLV

Works Cited

"Eric Whitacre." Absolute Astronomy. Absolute Astronomy. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. <http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Eric_Whitacre>.

Lefevre, Peter. "Walton Music - Eric Whitacre." Welcome to Walton Music. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. <http://www.waltonmusic.com/whitacre.html>.

Whitacre, Eric. "Cloudburst." Cloudburst – SATB Choral – Music Catalog –. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. <http://ericwhitacre.com/music-catalog/satb-choral/cloudburst>.

Whitacre, Eric. "Cloudburst En Ciudad De Mexico." Cloudburst En Ciudad De México – Blog –. 7 Apr. 2009. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. <http://ericwhitacre.com/blog/cloudburst-en- ciudad- de-mexico>.

Whitacre, Eric. "Three Flower Songs." Three Flower Songs – SATB Choral – Music Catalog –. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. <http://ericwhitacre.com/music-catalog/satb-choral/three- flower- songs>.