“There
are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle;
you can
live as if everything is a miracle.” — Albert Einstein
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William Zeitler has been a musician since age 5, when Santa brought a piano to his house. (The chimney was never the same.) Intrigued, he figured out how to climb up onto the bench in spite of his short legs, and started spending hours and hours trying to figure out how to play it. To preserve their sanity, his parents started William on lessons. When asked if his parents made him practice, he says: "No, my parents had to make me STOP!" Eventually William went on to earn a B.F.A from the California Institute of the Arts.
William's musical activities include:
* Composing for his CDs: he has released 10 CDs to date.
* Composing film scores: his most recent being the score for "VIRTIS, the Visible and InfraRed Thermal Imaging Spectrometer"—the story of a space probe, from concept to images being sent back, and the people behind it.
* Performing on the glass armonica: Benjamin Franklin's genius transformed the wet-finger-around-the-wineglass party trick into a magical musical instrument.
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Invented in 1761, it was very popular in Europe in Franklin's day—even Mozart and Beethoven composed for it. But musical fashions changed and it all but disappeared in the early 1800's. William is one of only a handful of glass armonica players worldwide. To learn more about the glass armonica, visit William's website devoted to it: www.GlassArmonica.com
William has performed worldwide on his glass armonica, and has been featured in film scores (the most recent being HBO's Taking Chance).
William has also been commissioned to compose and perform music for glass armonica and orchestra for the Seattle Philharmonic and Orchestra Seattle, and choral music (with and without the glass armonica) for I Cantori di Carmel (Monterey, CA), to name just a few.
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* Count Bachula: the not-so-great-great-great uncle of the famous J.S.Bach—on the Transylvania side. In the tradition of P.D.Q.Bach, some say William resembles Count Bachula, but of course that is ridiculous. See the Count's website, and his album Gothic Christmas.
* Church musician: William is a very capable organist and accompanist. Currently he is music director and lead player for a Taizé service (almost entirely music) on the first Sunday evening of each month at Redlands United Methodist Church (Redlands, CA). William also performs on his glass armonica at these Taizé services.
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