Streamwalker

Composer/pianist Craig Urquhart continues to create beautiful, compelling solo piano music, finding rich musical language to express profound spiritual connections between his soul and the world around him. Although Urquhart composes with clarity and balance, his creative process doesn't overwhelm an innate ability to sound fresh and improvised. He has a contemporary voice while drawing upon the inspiration of the great keyboard masters. Streamwalker, his latest album, finds another lovely extension of this unique vision. On his popular 2000 release Evocation, the classically trained musician drew upon his inspiration to address important environmental concerns. The album received international airplay, was named one of the best albums of the year by Solo Piano Publications, and earned Urquhart feature articles in Piano Today magazine, New Age Voice, and Gibson/Baldwin Player Magazine. Streamwalker, released by HeartEarthMusic, is his fifth album. Urquhart reaches a new emotional depth in his artistry by exploring, via his own inner journey, the human soul's response to the beauty of nature. The melody for the song that became the album's graceful and serene title track came to Urquhart one day in the spring, while he was literally balancing on the rocks in a winding stream in woods behind a friend's house in Rhode Island. He chose to bookend this set of 13 compositions with the optimism of Streamwalker and the similarly spirited opener, 'Morning Eagle,' to reflect our ability to appreciate that life is indeed a gift. Looking further upstream, Urquhart devotes much of this music to our collective desire to remain reflective yet optimistic. The striking CD cover shot shows a close up of Craig's right hand gently touching the stream, entering the world in which we interact with our environment. 'Streamwalker is about the impact of nature on me as an artist and human being, and the many moods it inspires,' he comments. 'Stepping on those stones in the middle of the stream, lost in the depth of the woods and the rays of the sun's light, I found the motif for the whole album' he adds. 'The name of the recording could mean a literal stream of water, or a stream of light. All these images remind me that nature is what gives us music: it's rhythm, it's color and it's forms. Nature captures the imagination, and I simply respond to it. Touching nature is the closest I come to touching my own spiritual center and the meaning of my existence. That is why I love the piano - it is a very organic instrument.' Listening to Streamwalker can inspire the kind of spiritual awakening Urquhart experienced while writing and recording these songs. The gentle caress of 'Morning Eagle' was inspired by a breathtaking experience he had watching eagles in flight while canoeing in the Boundary Waters between Minnesota and Canada. 'The eagle represents power and grace, and the song is more about the bird than about me,' he says. 'The Astronomer' is a deep and soulful meditation on the awe Urquhart often feels looking up at the night sky, 'where you can get lost in the infinite before you come back to reality.' The Astronomer's imagination is stimulated by the vastness of the universe. Urquhart returns to the shimmer of sparkling water with 'Silver Spring,' which carries an overall sense of sweetness and innocence. 'The Awakening' was composed as a birthday present for his friend Leonard Bernstein. Urquhart evokes an improvisational spirit on the playful, rambunctious