Friday, November 23, 2007

Gregory T.S. Walker, African American Composer and Violinist With CD “Electric Vivaldi”


[Electric Vivaldi, The Four Seasons; Antonio Vivaldi, composer; George Walker, composer; Gregory Walker, violin; Marcelo Sanches, electric cello; George Walker, electric violin; Lori Walker, synthesizer; Lori Lynne Walker, synthesizer; Boulder Philharmonic Orchestra; Eric Bertoluzzi, conductor; Newport Classic 85669 (2006)]


Dr. Gregory T. S. Walker is an African American composer and violinist whose parents are also professors of Music. Dr. Helen Walker-Hill is a pianist and scholar of music by African American women. Dr. George T. Walker is a composer and pianist who is the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music during his lifetime, in 1996. He is profiled at AfriClassical.com

Gregory Walker is Associate Professor of Music at the University of Colorado at Denver. His faculty web page and his personal website describe a prolific and adventurous composer and performer. The Orchestral Solos page of his website reads:

"...silky violin tone and beautifully calibrated phrasing..." - The Newark Star-Ledger

"Since his debut with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra in 1992, Gregory Walker's talents have been in demand for every conceivable musical challenge from the Colorado premiere of Black Romantic Joseph White's
Violin Concerto with the Loveland Chamber Orchestra to a cameo electric violin solo on tour with French pop star Anne Pigalle. Dr. Walker has performed throughout the United States and abroad with numerous orchestras including the Cleveland Chamber Symphony (Ohio), the Yaquina Chamber Orchestra (Oregon), Encuentro Musicale de los Americas (Havana, Cuba), the Breckenridge Festival Orchestra (Colorado), and the Filharmonia Sudecka (Walbrzych, Poland)."

Multimedia Guitar is a section which includes The Intelligent Life (music, dance, and drama) (1994). The Concert Works web page credits Walker with being the first Black composer of a rap symphony:

"In 1993, the Colorado Symphony commissioned Walker to compose what was acclaimed to be the first rap symphony, Dream N. the Hood. He received the American Academy of Arts and Letters Charles Ives Fellowship in 2000.

In performances ranging from Filharmonia Sudecka's premiere of the previously-censored
XUCUOYKCUFA in Poland to the Detroit Symphony's controversial reading of micro*phone for Amplified Orchestra, Walker has pushed the stylistic limits of the symphony orchestra."


Gregory+Walker" rel="tag">Gregory Walker
classical+music" rel="tag">classical music
Electric+Vivaldi" rel="tag">Electric Vivaldi
rap+symphony" rel="tag">rap symphony
Black+Violinist" rel="tag">Black Violinist
New+Age" rel="tag">New Age

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