Known for his innovative hybrids, award-winning composer Bill Whitley’s work bridges the boundaries between progressive rock, classical music, and raga traditions. Born into a multi-generation cattleman culture and a native of the Pacific Northwest, Bill draws inspiration from the region’s rural lifestyle and legendary landscapes. His music features intricate and hypnotic modal patterns, complex rhythmic interplay, and an expressive melodic core. At the center of all of his work is an abiding fascination with meditation traditions and mysticism.

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“Ad emergere, distintiva, è una vena narrativa che si esplica nella studiata interpolazione di incisivi episodi melodici e ritmici, insieme a momenti di sospeso e incantato lirismo.”

(A distinctive narrative that emerges is the interpolation of incisive melodic and rhythmic episodes, together with moments of suspended and enchanted lyricism.)

-Filippo Focosi, Kothodik eZine, October 2017

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"… exceptional command of melody and compositional form. The music…stands head and shoulders above others of its ilk…”

– Textura eZine, August 2017 review of I DREAM AWAKE.

 

"Whitley composes music of integrity and sophistication that’s also disarmingly accessible—not an easy combination to achieve, even if he makes it sound easy…”

-Textura eZine, August 2017

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Whitley’s music has been performed primarily in Italy, Russia, and in the U.S., by ensembles ranging from Symphony Orchestra to Solo Electric Guitar. Commissions consist of chamber, choral, vocal, and orchestral works. Recent commissions include Matilde alle Fontane (2022), with Big Mouth Society  in Portland, Oregon and Meditazioni sulla Dharmachakra (2017) by  KUBIN in Milan. The title track for his 2019 EP Then Elephant Speaks  was written for Civica Scuola di Musica Claudio Abbado's "Crossover Ensemble", Milan.​

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His recordings have been reviewed in Fanfare Magazine, American Record Guide, Take Effect Reviews, Aural Awakenings, Review Graveyard, Cinemusical, Infodad, and Midwest Record--and have been broadcast live on Radio Horizon 93.9 (Johannesburg, South Africa), CKUW (Winnepeg), WPRB (Princeton, NJ), WTUL (New Orleans), HRT (Croatia), KALX (Berkeley), WRUV (Burlington), and WMBR (Cambridge).

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Bill’s music is recorded on Da Vinci Edition, Navona Records, Ravello Records, and Teal Creek Music and some of his sacred choral works are published by Trinitas Choral Series.​

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