Eric Whitacre... is an American composer of choral, wind and electronic music. He has served as a guest conductor for ensembles throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and the Americas. He is one of the most popular and performed composers of his generation, his works being part of standard choral and symphonic repertoire. He is inspired by pop and electronic music and is known for his work with virtual choirs—creating choral community via the internet.Even if you don't like choral music, you should watch a couple minutes of this video to see what can be done with webcams, microphones, and a healthy dollop of imagination.
Addendum: The soundtrack of the video I posted above this one sounded familiar, and with a quick search I discovered that I had posted the musical arrangement back in 2010. I think it's worth a repost now.
And here's the wiki on "Lux Aurumque" -
Lux Aurumque ("Light and Gold", sometimes "Light of Gold") is a choral composition in one movement by Eric Whitacre. It is a Christmas piece based on a Latin poem of the same name, which translates as "Light, warm and heavy as pure gold, and the angels sing softly to the new born baby". In 2000, Whitacre set a short Latin text for mixed choir a cappella. In 2005, he wrote an arrangement for wind ensemble. The choral version became known through Whitacre's project Virtual Choir in 2009. The piece is also available for men's choir. Its duration is about four minutes.
Huge fan of the blog, huge fan of Whitacre. If you haven't heard the below piece, "Sleep" I highly recommend a good pair of headphones and closed eyes:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxjWNJU8rNE
Beautiful. Thanks, James.
DeleteI have an Eric Whitacre story.
ReplyDeleteMy daughter was in HS Marching Band back in 2004. The first competition I went to there was another Band from another school that did a piece called “October”. It was beautiful, beautiful enough to make me tear up. So after the competition I went and found that band and the director, and I shook his hand and told him how beautifully his kids had played this piece.
“Thank you” he said “Which child is yours?”
“Oh no” I said “My kid isn’t in this band. My kid goes to Bell HS”
He just looked at me like I was nuts.
So the next day I get on the computer to try to find out who wrote this piece “October”. All I got, Stan, was a bunch of “Oom-Pah” bands out of Minnesota, all 34000 of them. But I wasn’t very good at searching the net back then.
A few months later at the Christmas show, my daughters band played “Lux Arumsque”. Once again, a HS band made me weep. Such a beautiful song. So the next day I looked it up. It was easier to find than “October”.
But what was cool was to find the same guy that wrote “Lux Arumsque” had also written “October”.
I got to hand it to Eric Whitacre.
I hope you're not still looking for a recording of October! If you are I can point you in the right direction. Check out his piece Alleluia, it's a rescore of October for voices and it's just as beautiful.
DeleteNo, I found it when I found "Lux", but thanks James Z! And I will check Alleluia out.
DeleteI thought I recognized it as well. I enjoyed it just as much today as I did in 2010. Thanks!
ReplyDelete