Eric Benjamin conducting the Cleveland Philharmonic,
Cleveland State University. Shostakovich: Symphony #5, First Movement
"Music is a language rich in metaphor, a sonic construction presenting listeners with puzzles, symbols, dreams, mantras, images, sound effects, phonemes, sounds of nature and echoes from the womb. It is a structuring of forms of energy: kinetic energies of rhythms, the ebb and flow of time, the physicality of the dance, frequencies trembling the air, the beating of hearts, the drawing of breath, the movement to tears. Music is a primal urge and a high achievement of evolution, an exercise in abstract and conceptual thinking."
Eric Benjamin's earliest experiences with music still motivate him: Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" as heard in a sixth grade music class in his native St. Albans, Vermont. "I was transported from the mundane world of a classroom in a school in Vermont to a cave in Norway. Firelight danced with the shadows of trolls. It was mystery and power, communicated in a magical language of rhythms, pitches and timbres."
In the years that followed, during which he taught himself guitar, played in rock bands and revered the music of the Beatles, Doors, Eric Clapton, Paul Simon, and Blood, Sweat and Tears, he never forgot the experience that Grieg's music had given him. Participation in a school festival band (on baritone horn) prompted a decision to pursue classical music diligently and he taught himself score reading and music theory, took lessons on trombone, baritone, cello, voice and piano and made first attempts at composition.
At New England Conservatory of Music, he had the opportunity to study traditional and twelve-tone harmony with jazz great Joe Maneri and to observe rehearsals and concerts conducted by Gunther Schuller. "I skipped classes to watch a rehearsal of Mahler's Third Symphony and it was another touchstone moment - one of those events in life which you can refer to in terms of 'before' and 'after'."
His career as a teacher and conductor began at Newton(MA) North High School, while he acquired more directing and arranging experience as music director of a church music camp in Vermont. Teaching is one of his passions.
"I love to engineer interactions between music and young people. The challenge and joy for a music teacher is to connect up the intellectual, technical and scholarly aspects of music study with the electrical current that runs through kids and makes them want to study music in the first place."
In 1987, he returned to New England Conservatory to study orchestral conducting with Carl St. Clair. Further conducting studies took him to Gunther Schuller's Festival at Sandpoint (ID) and to Tanglewood, where he studied with Gustav Meier, Kurt Sanderling, Lukas Foss and Leonard Bernstein.
"Eric" is a Scandanavian title for a leader, and "Benjamin" is Hebrew meaning "son of the right hand" - with a name like that I had to go into conducting.
A brief tenure as director of the Mozart Society Orchestra at Harvard University was curtailed by his acceptance of a position on the conducting staff of the Akron Symphony, a position he held for eleven years. During that time, he served as director of the Akron Youth Symphony and appeared as guest conductor with the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra, Erie Philharmonic, Canton Symphony, Columbus Symphony and numerous student festivals. He also acquired experience as a composer and arranger, with many works performed by orchestras locally and across the nation.
In 1996, Eric became music director of the Tuscarawas Philharmonic, a position he still holds. "Tuscarawas County is a charming, rural region in east central Ohio. The Philharmonic rehearsals and concerts are joyful occasions in which we share the 'wow' moments of sonic splendor and the 'aha' moments of intellectual stimulation."