Official George Crumb webpage (includes upcoming events and performances, detailed compositional information and discography)



Sound Samples
Sound from Songs, Drones and Refrains of Death
Sound from Quest
Sound from Star-Child
Sound from Easter Dawning


George Crumb
George Crumb was born in Charleston, West Virginia on 24 October 1929. He studied at the Mason College of Music in Charleston and received the B.Mus. degree in 1950. Thereafter he studied for the Master's degree at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana under Eugene Weigel. He continued his studies under Boris Blacher at the Hochschule füür Musik, Berlin from 1954-1955. He received the D.M.A. in 1959 from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor after studying with Ross Lee Finney.
Crumb first taught theory and analysis at Hollins College, Virginia before being appointed as instructor and assistant professor in piano and composition at the University of Colorado, Boulder in 1958. From 1964-1965 he also acted as creative associate / composer-in-residence at the Buffalo Center for the Creative and Performing Arts, State University of New York, Buffalo. In 1965 a long association with the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia started with his appointment as assistant professor and then full professor. Since 1983 he is the Annenberg Professor of the Humanities. He retired in May 1997 from teaching. George Crumb married Elizabeth May Brown on May 21, 1949. They have one daughter and two sons.

Though George Crumb began composing as a teenager, he regards most of his early music as juvenilia, and has discouraged performances of these early compositions. Exceptions are Three Early Songs (1947), for voice and piano; Sonata (1955) for solo violoncello; and Variazioni (1959) for orchestra–the composer's doctoral thesis. In the 1960s and 1970s, George Crumb produced a series of compositions that were highly successful, earning the composer numerous international performances, recordings, and awards. Many of these were vocal works based on the poetry of Federico Garcia Lorca, including Ancient Voices of Children (1970); Madrigals, Books 1-4 (1965,69); Night of the Four Moons (1969); and Songs, Drones and Refrains of Death (1968). Other major works from this period include: Black Angels (1970), for electric string quartet; Vox Balaenae (1971), for electric flute, electric cello and amplified piano; Makrokosmos, Volumes 1 and 2 (1972, 73) for amplified piano; Music for a Summer Evening (1974) for two amplified pianos and percussion; and Crumb's largest score–Star-Child (1977), for soprano, solo trombone, antiphonal children's voices, male speaking choir, bell ringers and large orchestra.

Crumb's recent works include: Quest (1994) for guitar and chamber ensemble; Mundus Canis (1998) for guitar and percussion; Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik (2001) for amplified piano; ...Unto the Hills (2002) for folk singer, amplified piano and percussion quartet; and Otherwordly Resonances (2002) for two amplified pianos, A Journey Beyond Time (2003) for soprano, amplified piano and percussion quartet.

George Crumb is the recipient of numerous awards:

Elizabeth Croft fellowship for study, Berkshire Music Centre, 1955.

Fulbright Scholarship, 1955-6.

BMI student award, 1956.

Rockefeller grant, 1964.

National Institute of Arts and Letters grant, 1967.

Guggenheim grant, 1967, 1973.

Pulitzer Prize (for Echoes of Time and the River), 1968.

UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers Award, 1971.

Koussevitzky Recording Award, 1971.

Fromm grant, 1973.

Member, National Institute of Arts and Letters, 1975.

Ford grant, 1976.

Prince Pierre de Monaco Gold Medal, 1989.

Brandeis University Creative Arts Award.

Honorary member, Deutsche Akademie der Kunste.

Honorary member, International Cultural Society of Korea.

6 honorary doctorates.

1998 Cannes Classical Award: Best CD - Living Composer (BRIDGE 9069)

2000 Grammy for Best Contemporary Composition (Star-Child)

George Crumb discs on BRIDGE:

BRIDGE 9174 - Star-Child, Echoes of Time and the River; A Haunted Landscape

BRIDGE 9170 - Ancient Voices of Children, Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik, Madrigals, Bks. I-IV

BRIDGE 9155 - Makrokosmos, Vols I & II; Otherworldly Resonances

BRIDGE 9144 - Mundus Canis

BRIDGE 9139 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 7 - Unto the Hills, Black Angels

BRIDGE 9127 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 6 - Echoes of Time and the River, Gnomic Variations, Four Nocturnes, Lux Aeterna, Pastoral Drone

BRIDGE 9113 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 5 - A Haunted Landscape, Easter Dawning, Celestial Mechanics, Processional

BRIDGE 9105 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 4 - Zeitgeist, Music for a Summer Evening

BRIDGE 9095 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 3 - Star-Child, Mundus Canis, Three Early Songs

BRIDGE 9071 - George Crumb: Quest, Poul Ruders: Psalmodies, John Anthony Lennon: Zingari

BRIDGE 9069 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 2 - Quest, Night Music I, Federico's Little Songs for Children

BRIDGE 9028 - Complete Crumb Edition, Vol. 1 - Songs, Drones and Refrains of Death, Apparition, A Little Suite for Christmas, AD 1979

BRIDGE 9006 - George Crumb: Apparition; Charles Ives: Songs Down East