Eric Tuan
Recognized for his adventurous programming and passion for musical excellence, Artistic Director Eric Tuan brings a wealth of experience in the choral arts to the Piedmont East Bay Children’s Choir. Tuan received his B.A. in Music with Honors from Stanford University, and completed a Master of Music in Choral Studies with Distinction at the University of Cambridge with the support of a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. Tuan began his musical journey in the Piedmont East Bay Children’s Choir as a young chorister, and served on faculty as Ecco conductor and composer-in-residence before beginning his tenure as Artistic Director in July 2019.
Tuan currently serves as the founding Artistic Director of Convivium, the Peninsula-based chamber chorus he founded in 2012, and as Director of Music at Christ Episcopal Church, Los Altos. His dedication to the creation and exploration of new music has led him to conduct and perform the world premieres of over thirty works, including a program of new choral works celebrating the 500th anniversary of King’s College Chapel, Cambridge. Tuan has sung professionally with Volti, Cappella SF, and the Philharmonia Baroque Chorale, and has received acclaim for his sensitive work as a collaborative pianist, continuo player, and repetiteur. Among his mentors and conducting teachers are Stephen M. Sano, Jameson Marvin, Craig Jessop, Robert Geary, Stephen Layton, Stephen Cleobury, and David Skinner.
Tuan’s choral works, published by E.C. Schirmer, draw upon his diverse musical background to explore questions of transcendence and social justice. He has been widely commissioned by ensembles throughout the United States and Europe including Musae, the Fog City Singers, the Peninsula Women’s Chorus, and Vox Aurea. His music has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and Estonian Public Broadcasting.
PEBCC Artistic Vision
Choral music is a particularly powerful form of creating art. The human voice is our first instrument, and the one that evokes a deeply visceral response. And singing together, bringing together diverse voices into one song, holds an extraordinary power to build community across the lines that divide us. It is no surprise that nearly every culture holds a tradition of community singing, and that choral singing is the most popular form of participation in the performing arts in the United States.
Two factors make PEBCC’s contributions to the choral field unique. First of all, PEBCC is committed to choral music as a living, breathing art form. That has meant, from the earliest days, an unwavering commitment to musical exploration, as exemplified in a rigorous training program to develop the skills our singers need to explore new and challenging music; an adventurous and broad-ranging commissioning program; an eagerness to collaborate across disciplines; and a willingness to address contemporary social challenges in the art we make together.
Second, PEBCC believes that singing together creates community, and is committed to building bridges with integrity between singers, communities, and cultures. On the international level, PEBCC creates deep and meaningful opportunities for cultural exchange through its annual international tours and hosting of the triennial Golden Gate International Choral Festival. In addition to intensive collaborations and performances with partner choirs from around the world, homestay programs offer the opportunity to build cross-cultural friendships that can last a lifetime. On the organizational level, PEBCC creates opportunities for students to build bridges with each other through peer-led mentoring programs, meaningful opportunities for student leadership, and engaging students as artistic equals in the creative process.
My vision as Artistic Director is to expand upon PEBCC’s historic strengths in adventurous musical exploration and community building, preserving the musical and cultural experiences cherished by the PEBCC family while renewing them for an ever-changing world. Specific goals include:
(1) Musical Exploration: a new focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion in our programming and commissioning projects.
• In my first season with PEBCC, I launched a commissioning project for our upcoming Golden Gate Festival focused on climate change. We commissioned three female-identified composers, two of them women of color, to write new works for the festival on an environmental theme. I aim to continue this focus on historically underrepresented minorities in our commissioning of new works and in our regular programming, as well as a topical focus on contemporary social challenges.
• I also aim to reimagine the choral canon through innovative programs that lift up historically marginalized voices from the past, reminding us that people of color and women have played significant roles in the Western choral tradition. As Ecco conductor, I led the modern premiere of two newly discovered Baroque works from Guatemala with historical instruments. Ensemble has also shared music from the medieval convent of Las Huelgas, where a choir of one hundred nuns sang sophisticated polyphony in defiance of ecclesiastical law.
(2) Community Building: strengthening our local and international choral community at every level.
• The triennial Golden Gate International Choral Festival is one of the primary ways in which PEBCC builds bridges among the global choral community. I would like to bring the festival onto a more secure financial and administrative footing, as well as expand its educational component. In addition to the rich opportunities for cultural exchange, friendly competition, and musical growth that already exist, I hope to create opportunities for conductors from different cultures to share insights on choral practice in their communities.
• I aim for PEBCC to bring a more diverse array of students from a variety of racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds into our community. PEBCC’s student body does not fully reflect the rich diversity of our East Bay community, and we have work to do to remove barriers to access for low-income students and students of color.
• PEBCC has an enormous network of alums who treasure their time and memories in the choir. While many of them (including me) are still engaged with the organization as artistic faculty, office staff, tour chaperones, camp counselors, and more, there is a wealth of opportunities for us to expand and deepen our engagement with the alumni community.
• PEBCC teaches our students not only how to make music, but how to make relationships and how to live together intentionally in community. For example, small-group conversations with the students in our top touring choir last year encouraged us to collectively adopt a new model for student leadership and a new process for electing leaders. I would like to continue working at every level to find new opportunities for student engagement, leadership, and connection.
Eric Tuan, Artistic Director
August 2020