Be Inspired by Art.
Art brings beauty and feeling to our lives, and it can motivate us to action. In this section, learn more about the art that has inspired the composer of Mosaic for Earth, the performers, and the environmental artists whose work was displayed at the premiere performance.
Arts and Literature Collaborators: Mosaic for Earth
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What Inspires Composer Dwight Bigler
As the composer of Mosaic for Earth, Dwight Bigler draws from many different sources of inspiration for this work and his other compositions. Some of his favorite environmentally themed music is listed below. Search for those titles on YouTube, and just keep exploring and listening!
You can also click the button below to watch him describe his composition process for Mosaic for Earth as part of the VT Lifelong Learning Institute program.
Click here to watch his Mosaic for Earth presentation to the New River Valley Master Naturalists.
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What Inspires Mary Denson Moore, VT English Faculty
The world premiere of Mosaic for Earth was dedicated to Mary Denson Moore, faculty in the English Department at Virginia Tech, alto in the Blacksburg Master Chorale, and dear friend of Dwight Bigler. Mary Denson was one of the people who introduced Dwight to the environmental problems in our part of Virginia and the important environmental literature which ultimately led to Mosaic for Earth.
Explore her list of favorite environmental authors below, and use them as a launching pad for your own continued reading.
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Barbara Wolff's Illuminations
Barbara Wolff’s illuminations of Psalm 104 were an important influence on the structure and content of Mosaic for Earth. Click the button below to watch videos about her creative process and learn more about her stunning work.
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The Art of Dr. Diane Relf
Diane Relf is a professor emerita of Horticulture at Virginia Tech, Master Gardener, and artist who works in recycled materials to bring awareness of the connection between humans and nature. Dr. Relf provided the art on display at the Moss Arts Center during the premiere performance of Mosaic for Earth. Click the button to learn more about the pieces on display and the story of the materials used in their creation.
COMPOSERS:
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The Dr. Lucy Jones Center has compiled an inspiring body of resources. Check out their Tempo Toolkit, Tempo Dialogues (including an interview with Dwight Bigler as one of their featured guest composers), and more ways to get involved. https://drlucyjonescenter.org/tempo/
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A one-of-a-kind creative adventure for composers. Explore the inspiring wilderness of Alaska’s backcountry, compose music about it, and have it premiered by top performers. Composinginthewilderness.com.
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Landscape Music is a network of musical artists. Our mission is to deepen public appreciation of the natural world by providing a platform for contemporary composers and performers whose music engages with landscape, nature, and place. Landscapemusic.org
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Artists have created art in national parks since the late 19th century when famed Hudson River School painters captured the majestic views of our nation's western parks. Today, the sights and sounds in national parks continue to inspire artists in more than 50 residency programs across the country. Click here for more information.
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Music that informs, connects, and inspires people to act for environmentally just causes. www.https://ecovoiceproject.org/
Check out these organizations that support the creation of environmentally themed music:
Music About Nature
Some of Dwight Bigler’s favorites
Vocal / Choral Music
The Blue Ridge (Elaine Hagenberg)
The Peace of Wild Things (Jake Runestad)
Flower Songs (Benjamin Britten)
Walden Pond (Dominick Argento)
Earth Song (Frank Ticheli)
Rivers of Light (Ēriks Ešenvalds)
Epitaph for Moonlight, Snowforms (R. Murray Schafer)
Cloudburst (Eric Whitacre)
Waldesnacht (Johanned Brahms)
The Nightingale (Ugis Pralines)
The Brightness of Light (Kevin Puts)
Orchestral/Instrumental Ensemble Music
The Planets (Gustav Holst)
Become Ocean (John Adams, Pulitzer Prize 2014)
Anthracite Fields (Julia Wolfe, Pulitzer Prize 2015)
Sky (Michael Torke, concerto for violin)
Ice Field (Henry Brant, Pulitzer Prize 2002)
Symphony No. 6, Pastorale (Ludwig van Beethoven)
Kingfishers Catch Fire (John Mackey)
Symphony No.2, “Mysterious Mountain” (Alan Hovhaness)
And God Created Great Whales (Alan Hovhaness)
Celestial Fantasy (Alan Hovhaness)
Grand Canyon Suite (Ferde Grofé)
Appalachian Spring (Aaron Copland)
La Mer (Claude Debussy)
Night on Bald Mountain (Modest Mussorgsky)
The Carnival of the Animals (Camille Saint-Saëns)
Environmental Literature
Favorites of Mary Denson Moore
If you want to read more from Erik Reece:
Lost Mountain: A Year in the Vanishing Wilderness
Utopia Drive: A Road Trip through America’s Most Radical Idea
An American Gospel: On Family, History, and the Kingdom of God
The Embattled Wilderness: The Natural and Human History of Robinson Forest and the Fight for its Furture
Practice Resurrection: And Other Essays
If you are interested in coal country:
Denise Giardina: Storming Heaven and Unquiet Earth (fiction)
Erik Reece: Lost Mountain (non-fiction)
Lon Savage: Thunder in the Mountains (non-fiction)
Robert Shogan: Battle for Blair Mountain (non-fiction)
Michael Schnayerson: Coal River (non-fiction)
Ann Pancake: Strange as the Weather Has Been (fiction)
If you like E. 0. Wilson, pick one of his books and go for a ride. He has written many. He was a Harvard entomologist. If you don't read him, at least watch Lord of the Ants. If you are a scientist, he is a must read.
If you are headed out west this summer:
Edward Abbey. Desert Solitaire. (non-fiction) or The Monkey Wrench Gang (fiction)
If you are interested in natural gas issues:
Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America by Eliza Griswold
If you want to read more from Terry Tempest Williams:
Refuge, memoir
When Women Were Birds, memoir on finding voice
Leap, art history, ornithology, theology
Finding Beauty in a Broken World, memoir on Ravenna mosaics, prairie dog research, and Rwandan genocide
Red. Short essays.
An Unspoken Hunger. Short essays.
Desert Quartet. Lyrical meditations on the desert.
The Hour of Land, essays about Williams experiences in the National Parks.
Erosion: Essays of Undoing
The Moon is Behind Us
If you are interested in the intersection of nuclear development and humans:
Full Body Burden (non-fiction). Kristen Iversen
The Day We Bombed Utah (non-fiction), John G. Fuller
If you like Barbara Kingsolver:
Prodigal Summer (fiction). Environment novel set near Abingdon, Virginia
Poisonwood Bible (fiction). Missionary movement in Africa
Flight Behavior (fiction). Coal country
Unsheltered. Darwin, Mary Treat
Additional books:
Sudden Spring, Rick Van Noy
The Overstory, Richard Powers
Lab Girl, Hope Jahren
Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens
Salvage the Bones, Jesmyn Ward
