Pulitzer Prize-winning composer George Crumb leads an American tour, celebrating his 75th birthday with concert performances, lectures and master classes. Joining Crumb are an ensemble of three leading Crumb specialists–Tony Arnold, soprano; Robert Shannon, piano; and David Starobin, guitar. The Crumb Ensemble's tour program spans 55 years of George Crumb's creative output, and finishes with the composer himself taking center-stage and performing the percussion part to his duo for guitar and percussion- Mundus Canis.

George Crumb, composer and percussionist

George Crumb's reputation as a composer of hauntingly beautiful scores has made him one of the most frequently performed composers in today's musical world. From Los Angeles to New York, from Madrid to Moscow, and from Scandinavia to South America, festivals devoted to the music of George Crumb have sprung up like wildflowers. Now approaching his 75th birthday year, Crumb, the winner of Grammy and Pulitzer Prizes, continues to compose new scores that are enriching the musical lives of all who come in contact with his profoundly humanistic art. Crumb's music often juxtaposes contrasting musical styles. The references range from music of the western art-music tradition, to hymns and folk music, to non-Western musics. Many of Crumb's works include programmatic, symbolic, mystical and theatrical elements, which are often reflected in his beautiful and meticulously notated scores.

A shy, yet warmly eloquent personality, Crumb retired from his teaching position at the University of Pennsylvania after more than 30 years of service. Honored by numerous institutions with honorary Doctorates, and the recipient of dozens of awards and prizes, Crumb makes his home in Pennsylvania, in the same house where he and his wife of more than 50 years raised their three children. George Crumb's music is published by C.F. Peters and the ongoing series of "Complete Crumb" recordings, supervised by the composer, is being issued on Bridge Records. In 2004, in honor of the composer's 75th birthday, Musical America named George Crumb its "Composer of the Year."

Robert Shannon, pianist

Robert Shannon has performed throughout the United States, Europe, South America and Asia. His repertoire ranges from J.S. Bach to John Adams, and he is especially noted for his penetrating interpretations of recent American music. Mr. Shannon has commissioned and championed many new compositions by today's leading composers, and his recordings have received rave reviews in the world press. Mr. Shannon has performed regularly at the Grand Teton Music Festival, the Festival Tibor Varga in Switzerland, at the Sacramento Festival of American Music and as guest artist with the Chicago Contemporary Chamber Players. In recent seasons he has appeared in London, Paris, Glasgow, Rome, Stuttgart, Hamburg, New York, San Francisco, Columbia (South America) and Taiwan.

Mr. Shannon, whose major teachers were Jack Radunsky, Ania Dorfmann and Dorothy Taubman, is a member of the piano faculty at the Oberlin Conservatory and is a Director of the Oberlin Festival and Competition. For Bridge Records Robert Shannon has recorded Ives's Concord Sonata and John Harbison's Piano Sonata, No. 1 (BRIDGE 9036); Ives's complete works for violin and piano (BRIDGE 9024A/B); a disk of keyboard works by Tod Machover (BRIDGE 9040); George Crumb's Celestial Mechanics and Processional (BRIDGE 9113); and Crumb's Gnomic Variations and 4 Nocturnes (BRIDGE 9127). In Summer of 2004 Shannon's recording of both volumes of Crumb's Makrokosmos will be released on Bridge Records.

Tony Arnold, soprano

Clarity, depth, imagination, and vocal beauty mark the performances of the American soprano Tony Arnold. In March 2001, Ms. Arnold was thrust into the international spotlight when she became the first vocalist ever to be awarded First Prize in the prestigious Gaudeamus International Interpreters Competition (Holland). On the heels of that triumph, Ms. Arnold took First Prize at the 15th Annual Louise D. McMahon International Music Competion (USA). Ms. Arnold's work has focused on some of the most innovative composers of our time, including György Ligeti, Thomas Ad?s, Luciano Berio, György Kurtag, George Crumb, Bernard Rands, Elliott Carter, and Oliver Knussen.

Tony Arnold's highly anticipated debut recordings are being issued during the 2003-4 season, and include Elliott Carter's Of Challenge and of Love (Bridge Records); George Crumb's Madrigals (Bridge); Luciano Berio's Sequenza (Naxos); and Milton Babbitt's Quatrains (Bridge). Ms. Arnold has appeared with leading new music ensembles across the nation, including eighth blackbird, The Furious Band, Chicago Contemporary Players, Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, Cincinnati Symphony Chamber Players, Duo Atipica, Ad Hoc String Quartet, and the Contemporary Ensembles of Oberlin College, Princeton University, Northwestern University, and the University of Chicago. Collaborative pianists have included Jacob Greenberg, Diana Schmück, and Robert Spano. Ms. Arnold is currently a Professor of Voice at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

David Starobin, guitar

David Starobin's performances have earned the native New Yorker prominence in the world of classical music. Starobin is the only guitarist to have been awarded Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Career Prize (1988), and he has been honored by Harvard University's Fromm Foundation for "his commitment to the music of our time." He is a professor of the guitar department at The Manhattan School of Music.

During the past 30 years, more than 300 works have been composed for and dedicated to Starobin, including compositions by George Crumb, Poul Ruders, Elliott Carter, Gunther Schuller, and Lukas Foss. Starobin has had a particularly close relationship with George Crumb. After meeting Crumb in 1970, Starobin went on to play all of Crumb's plucked instrument parts–including those for electric guitar, mandolin, banjo and sitar. Crumb then composed two works for Starobin–a guitar chamber concerto entitled Quest (1994) and the duo Mundus Canis ("A Dog's World") (1998) for guitar and percussion. Starobin and Crumb have toured together throughout the USA and Europe, performing Mundus Canis for delighted audiences. In recent years, David Starobin has been the producer of the Bridge Records CD series of George Crumb's complete output, including Crumb's magnum opus, Star-Child, which was awarded a Grammy.