Sonic landscapes: The environmental choral music of R. Murray Schafer and John Luther Adams

Abstract

During the past several decades, there has been a growing trend to address social concerns through choral music. Composers have taken on such topics as civil rights, suicide prevention, LGBTQ rights, women’s issues, as well as other current affairs. One of the sub-genres of this socially conscious repertoire is choral music that focuses on the ecology and the growing concern of environmental issues. Composers are engaging with this topic in a variety of ways, but few North American composers have devoted themselves so thoroughly to this genre as have R. Murray Schafer and John Luther Adams, both of whom have found inspiration as composers through their work as environmental activists. Schafer’s Landscapes and Soundscapes (2010) and Adams’s Canticles of the Holy Wind (2017) are two prominent examples from this repertoire, each exhibiting a unique relationship to the natural world. By examining these two compositions, as well as other recent works in the genre, this paper will explore the concept of environmental activism through choral music and its relevance in the field.