Crumb utilized the vocabulary of extended vocal and instrumental techniques common to many 20th-century composers and expanded them considerably. The conciseness and attention to detail are reminiscent of Webern, and the delicacy of the line derives from Eastern music.
Although Crumb listed Debussy, Mahler, and Bartók as being his principal musical influences, the works themselves suggest far broader origins. An appointment at the University ofĬolorado (1959-1965) and a position as creative associate at the Center of Creative and Performing Arts in Buffalo (1964-1965), preceded his longtime post at the University of Pennsylvania.Īn extremely well-integrated eclecticism characterizes Crumb's mature works after the early 1960s. Crumb also studied with Boris Blacher at the Berkshire Music Center and at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik (1955-1956). He earned degrees from Mason College, Charleston, (B.M., 1950) the University of Illinois (M.M., 1952) and the University of Michigan (D.M.A., 1959), where he studied with Ross Lee Finney. His mother was also a cellist, so Crumb's childhood was saturated with musical inspiration, such that by nine years old he already played piano by ear. The latter, especially, remained an influence in his mature compositions. He began writing music shortly after his tenth year, motivated by his father, who was a clarinetist and bandleader, and by the popular and religious music of his native Appalachia.
George Crumb was born in Charleston, West Virginia, on October 24, 1929.
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