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Biography


Christopher Eastburn is a versatile musician, director, and award-winning composer. Chris’s composing, arranging and orchestrating is a synergistic culmination of his work as a producer and choral director, composition training, and wide ranging stylistic interests from early music, to traditional folk, jazz and contemporary classical music.  He creates energetic, melodic, and emotionally-visceral vocal and instrumental music. To commissions and collaborations he brings attention to detail and expert musicianship together with a perspective of emotional depth and understanding and respect for the range of human experience--inspiring contemporary ballet and theatre scores to engaging choral pieces and colorful orchestral arrangements.

In 2008, Chris enjoyed crafting the music for a ballet score Newport Stories, an emotional journey through Newport, RI's history with chorus, instrumental ensemble, and tape of ambient recordings, commissioned by Newport RI's contemporary ballet company Island Moving Co. for their 25th anniversary.    The text for the piece is from Newport poets and interviews by a contemporary reporter. 

"A pure, intense sense of place.  A pure, intense sense of time.  Tunes and images you can't get out of your head--and don't want to.  What more can you ask of a show?"
John D. Donahue, professor Harvard’s Kennedy School

Also for Island Moving Co., Chris wrote the music for Consent to Gravity, a ballet score for string quartet & vocal quartet performed at the Providence Performing Arts Center, the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the RISD museum, Pace-McGill in NYC, MassArt in Boston and by the faculty quartet as part of Music at Port Milford chamber music festival in Ontario.

"Chris Eastburn's score for the Providence String Quartet was one of the most successful new musical works for dance I've heard in ages." --Debra Cash, dance critic for National Public Radio's Here and Now

Recent orchestration commissions include 2 arrangements for orchestra and treble chorus for the Jacksonville Children's Chorus, Florida.  One of these, "Jazzy Old St. Nick, a hip swing version of a Christmas favorite" is being published by Hal Leonard and will be available for the Christmas 2009 season.  Also arranged by Chris for orchestra and treble chorus,  a song by Nick Page called "Stars, Songs, and Faces" was performed twice at Carnegie Hall, NYC during the 2007-2008 concert season.

Also in 2008 Chris collaborated with Caitlin Corbett Dance Co., creating the score (studio instrumental) for Tom's Wealth: A Dance for the Masses, premiered at the Tsai Performance Center in Boston.  Commissioned by Caitlin Corbett Dance company, the score is a series of fascinating instrumental recompositions based upon traditional American folk melodies.

"Chris Eastburn's delicious twisting of Americana favorites."
Boston Pheonix on the music for Tom's Wealth

 Additionally in the past year, Chris was commissioned by the Moses Brown School with funding from the Rhode Island Council for the Arts to write the vocal and string ensemble score for Moses Brown and the Story of the Slave Ship Sally, a breakthrough dramatic exploration of Rhode Island's historical involvement in the Triangle (slave) Trade.

Past commissions include a piece for the nationally renowned PALS Children's Chorus celebrating the town of Brookline's 300th Anniversary (libretto from Brookline poet Margo Lockwood)  performed at Boston’s Jordan Hall, a score for As You Like It for the MIT Shakespeare Ensemble, orchestra arrangements for the von Trapp family’s newest generation of singers, scores for Tufts University faculty choreographer Danny McCusker, and a co-commission with Eliza Moore “Castles in the Air” premiered by PALS at the American Choral Directors Association conference at Harvard’s Sanders Theater.

In the Boston area, Chris directs the much heralded Family Folk Chorale.  Under his direction the group has grown from 15 to 60 singers, ages 3 to 83, and has had a 40 family waiting list.  The chorale has sold out shows at the historic Club Passim, the Regent Theatre, and the Museum of Our National Heritage, done benefit concerts for the U.N. World Food Programme, the Arlington-Teosinte Sister City Project, etc. and has performed with Robbie O’Connell (of the Clancy Bros.), Tracy Grammer, Bill Staines, Sol Y Canto, Mark Simos and Scott Alarik (folk reviewer for the Boston Globe, Sing Out!, and NPR’s Here and Now Program).

Each summer, Chris conducts the choir at Music at Port Milford summer music school and festival.  He has studied at Connecticut College, Yale University, Aspen & Bowdoin Festivals and Boston University (M.M. ’97) where the faculty elected him to the National Music Honor Society.  Ensemble (non-directing) experience has included collaborations with singer-songwriter Eliza Moore and her Celtic-influenced folk band (arranging, guitar, and vocal harmonies), the Boston Secession (tenor), tenor section leader for the adult choir at the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill and in BU’s Marsh Chapel choir, rock band William Wants a Doll (lead guitar, composer, and vocalist), and the Portland Early Music Consort (lutenist and arranger). 

Chris enjoys composing for and working with a variety of ensembles and making music with people of all ages and walks of life.



Resume

COMPOSITION                            

Commissions 
                                     
Newport’s Island Moving Co, Newport RI: Newport Stories choral/instrumental/tape ballet score,
    Consent to Gravity vocal/string quartet ballet score, premiered by Providence String Quartet

Moses Brown School, Providence RI:  string orchestra, percussion and choral score for the theatre project     Moses Brown & the Story of the Slave Ship Sally

Caitlin Corbett Dance Company, Boston MA:  studio created ballet score for Tom’s Wealth

Jacksonville Children’s Chorus, FL: orchestrations for performances with Jacksonville Symphony

PALS Children’s Chorus: choral/instrumental works Call Across the Generations for town of Brookline, MA’s 300th anniversary, and "Castles in the Air", co-written with Eliza Moore for PALS finale piece at Eastern American Choral Directors Assoc. convention 2004

Rattlesby Management, Atlanta GA:  orchestral arrangements touring internationally with the Von Trapp       Children  (performances with major pops orchestras)

Tufts University, Medford MA: modern dance scores for Tufts faculty member and choreographer Daniel McCusker including WIDE for chorus, piano, cello, clarinet and tape

MIT Shakespeare Ensemble:  vocal score with lute, gamba, recorders for As You Like It

Andover-Newton Theological School, Newton MA:  vocal, flute and electronics score for TEA a performance project based on the Japanese Tea Ceremony

Choreographer Amy Larimer, NYC: Lepidopteran Caper- tape, Cup and Cans- tape,

American Renaissance Theatre, Portland ME:  lute, recorder and vocal score for Henry IV part II


Performances at venues in U.S., Canada, and Australia including the following:
New York City:  Carnegie Hall (orchestration Stars., Songs and Faces), Pace-McGill (Consent to   Gravity), and Merce Cunningham Studios (Amy Larimer Dance)

Los Angeles:  Getty Performing Arts Center (Consent to Gravity)

Boston:  NEC Jordan Hall (Call Across the Generations), Mass College of Art (Consent to Gravity), Tsai Center (Tom’s Wealth)

Cambridge MA:  Harvard University Sanders Theatre (Castles in the Air)

Providence RI:  RISD Museum, Providence Performing Arts Center (Consent to Gravity)

Omaha, NE:  Rose Theater (I’m Going to Spangola)

Australia:  Musica Viva Australia (I’m Going to Spangola)

Canada- Music at Port Milford Chamber Music Festival (Consent to Gravity, Newport Stories)


Publications
Orchestral arrangement under publication with Hal Leonard for Christmas 2009 

Two best-selling choral works published by PALS Presents performed nationally by numerous children’s choruses. 

Distinctions and Membership
“Spangola” invited to be the U.S. representative song to Lo Zecchino d’Oro in Bologna, Italy

Winner of Kid Sing international composers’ competition, May 2000. 

Member of ASCAP and the American Music Center

“I had the privilege of collaborating with the very talented Boston composer, Chris Eastburn…what impressed me most was how terrific his orchestration was- it ‘played itself’, was extremely creative, whimsical yet ‘tidy’.  The recording has received many well-deserved accolades and prizes.  The combination of his musical creativity, his craftsmanship and his ability to conceive, organize and complete a project are most impressive and, I believe, hard to come by in the world of music! ”
-- Johanna Hill Simpson, Artistic Director, nationally renowned PALS Children’s Chorus


"Chris is an exceptionally broadminded and talented musician who combines
a knowledge of and respect for musical tradition with a vast talent for stylistic versatility.”
--August Watters, faculty member, Berklee College of Music


CHORAL
       

Choral Conductor, Music at Port Milford, Ontario, Canada                         (Summers) 1999-Present     
Teaches alongside faculty members from Toronto Symphony & Canadian Ballet Orchestra. Selects repertoire, rehearses and conducts 40-voice choir and 12-voice madrigal choir of students for performances at this international chamber music festival.  Repertoire ranges from Palestrina to contemporary music.

Artistic Director/Arranger, Family Folk Chorale, Arlington, MA             1999-Present
Programs, arranges music and conducts rehearsals and concerts for 60-voice intergenerational chorus and instrumental ensemble performing American folk music.  Sold out performances at venues including the National Heritage Museum, Arlington’s Regent Theatre and the legendary Club Passim.  Performances with Scott Alarik (Radio Host, Boston Globe Folk writer), Robbie O’Connell (Clancy Bros.), Jennifer Kimball (Polygram recording artist), Tracy Grammer & Jim Henry (Signature Sounds recording artists), Bill Staines & Sol Y Canto.   Under Chris’s direction, the group has grown from 15 members to 60 members with a 40-family waiting list.

Trustee, PALS Children’s Chorus, Brookline, MA                                 2000-2007
Board member with nationally-renowned children’s chorus which has performed in Carnegie Hall, Boston Symphony Hall, and Tanglewood, and with the Boston Symphony Orchestra

Classroom Instructor, Boston University, Boston, MA                  1994-95, 1996-97
As a graduate student, taught well-received classes in ear training, including solfege and harmonic and rhythmic dictation to undergraduates.  Utilized traditional and popular styles for dictation and explanation of theoretical/harmonic concepts.

Music Director, Arranger  Children’s Theater of Maine, Portland, ME                        1992-1994
Auditioned singers and instrumentalists; developed musical concepts for shows in collaboration with directors; wrote and arranged original scores; rearranged pre-existing scores; conducted rehearsals and performances.

     
EDUCATION       

Boston University, Boston, MA                                           M.M. 1997
Composition studies with Charles Fussell and Tison Street
Conducting Studies with Theodore Antoniou
Honors:     Elected by the Faculty to the National Music Honor Society (Pi Kappa Lambda)
Merit based scholarship and teaching assistantship

Connecticut College, New London, CT                  B.A. 1991
Composition studies with David Vayo & Noel Zahler
Conducting Studies with Paul Althouse
Honors:     Distinction in Music

Yale University, New Haven, CT                            spring semester  1990
 Visiting music student, composition studies with Jan Radzynski                      
 private composition study with Jan Radzynski                          1991


FESTIVALS   

Bowdoin Music Festival, Brunswick, ME                              1993
Fellowship Composer, Master Classes with George Crumb,
Jacob Druckman, Elliott Schwartz, William Bolcom
                     
Aspen Music Festival, Aspen, CO                                  1991                       
Composition program.  Studied with George Tsontakis

Sonoklect New Music Festival, Lexington, VA                              1991
One of ten undergraduate composers selected nationwide, full scholarship
Composition performed by bassist Robert Black