Eric Whitacre

A composer renowned primarily for choral compositions, Eric Whitacre has produced numerous works for wind band along with select electronic pieces. Works for orchestra followed the initial compositions that emerged in the early 1990s, while his debut opera, Paradise Lost: Shadows and Wings, reached the stage in 2007. One of his most recognized efforts arrived in 2010 with the “virtual choir” version of Lux Aurumque, assembled from more than a hundred vocalists across twelve nations. Approachable in character, his idiom centers on signature harmonic constructions—sevenths and ninths often set against sustained seconds and fourths—alongside surprising progressions, aleatoric devices, choral finger snapping, and numerous other distinctive traits. Although contemporary and highly personal, this sonic palette incorporates historical resonances: the orchestral arrangement of Water Night, first conceived for voices, recalls Barber’s Adagio for Strings, and listeners have drawn parallels between Whitacre’s manner and that of Morten Lauridsen. Even so, he ranks among the most distinctive creators of his generation, with his output—especially the choral scores—receiving frequent performances worldwide. Serving as both composer and conductor on his inaugural album, Light & Gold appeared on Decca in 2012 and ascended to the top of the classical charts in the U.S. and U.K.

Whitacre entered the world in Reno, Nevada, on January 2, 1970. Although music interested him during adolescence through participation in the Douglas High School Band in Minden, Nevada, serious study commenced only upon enrollment at the University of Nevada, where composer Virko Baley proved his principal mentor. Choral conducting lessons came from David Weiller. At Juilliard he completed a master’s degree under David Diamond and John Corigliano. By the mid-1990s, choral pieces such as the 1992 Cloudburst and 1995 Water Night were circulating widely. Recordings began surfacing in the late 1990s, and before reaching his thirties Whitacre had secured international standing among leading American composers. Attention extended beyond choral music when the Eric Whitacre Wind Symphony Festival was founded in Australia at the Sydney Opera House in 2004; additional festivals followed in Venice and Florence from 2007 onward.

A well-received survey of his choral music, including Water Night and Cloudburst, was issued by Hyperion in 2006. Further recordings appeared as live performances continued in concert venues. The opera Paradise Lost received its premiere in July 2007 at the Theatre at Boston Court. In the late 2000s a submitted video of one of his choral works prompted Whitacre to gather global vocal contributions, resulting in “virtual choir” realizations of the a cappella Sleep and the single-movement Lux Aurumque. The latter combined 185 voices from twelve countries; the accompanying video uploaded in 2010 quickly spread online. October of that year saw the Decca release of Light & Gold, which led the Billboard classical album chart and earned the 2012 Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance—the same year Whitacre made his BBC Proms debut. He also issued a second Decca album, Water Night, which likewise reached number one on the traditional classical listing.

Whitacre led a 400-voice choir in The Star-Spangled Banner for a Flag Day concert on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., in 2014. Drawing inspiration from the Hubble Space Telescope’s Deep Field image, he composed Deep Field for chorus and orchestra in 2015; the Minnesota Orchestra and Minnesota Chorale premiered it under his direction that year. Collaboration with NASA and the Space Telescope Science Institute produced the 2018 film Deep Field: The Impossible Magnitude of the Universe, scored by the work and featuring an 8,000-voice virtual choir. The twelve-movement Sacred Veil, setting poetry by lyricist Charles Anthony Silvestri and drawn from the life and 2005 cancer-related death of his wife Julie, received its world premiere at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles in February 2019. A recording by the Los Angeles Master Chorale under Whitacre appeared on Signum Classics in 2020.