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A prolific composer, Paul has an infinite range of mood, imagery, feeling and sensitivity, and a tremendous palette of musical instruments. His music ranges from the most barely audible tones of a harp all the way to full symphonic scores. Paul plays LIVE for the Whales off the coast of Maui in 1976. His music is non-rhythmic, a very important aspect of healing music, and he has been recognize d as one of America's foremost composers of music for health and spiritual renewal.
Born in Los Angeles, California, Paul began his musical training at age seven. By his mid-teens Paul was studying advanced piano composition and technique with the noted Esther Lipton. After completing his studies in literature at UCLA, he continued his musical education in Florence, Italy. It was while in Europe that Paul began to develop an original, yet classical style of composition and performance for the piano. Influenced strongly by well-known composers such as Debussy, Ravel, and Fauré, the music of PLW is modern, yet classically based, and wonderful to listen to.
Returning to the United States in 1963, Paul settled in New York City. Paul spent the following five years exploring the neophyte electronic music movement then taking hold in the city, while working as a freelance photographer. In 1968, Paul moved his newfound knowledge to the more relaxed environment of Maui, Hawaii. While in Hawaii, he continued developing a style of composition and performance, true to the guiding principles of the classics, yet infused with modern interpretation, personal reflections, and inspired by the beauty of nature. This can be heard in his first album, Waterfall Music, released in the late 1970's in the Hawaiian Islands.
While in Hawaii, Paul became the first musician to play music for Humpback whales in the open ocean on a 70 foot sailboat. With the use of a white grand piano fastened mid-ship and sophisticated underwater speakers, he played his music to nearby whales who swam underneath the boat for several hours, turning cartwheels, like acrobats underwater. Their joyful responses, caught on film by marine divers, were an inspiration and milestone to the artist and to thousands who watched the documentary on public television channels.
Upon his return to the mainland in 1983, Paul made his residence in California. From his coastal location he traveled throughout the United States in his motor coach specially outfitted with a digital recording studio. He returned to Honolulu briefly to play music for the Dolphins at Sea Life Park, a Dolphinarium on the coast of Oahu. The music was piped underwater and the following photograph shows the response the dolphins made by literally dancing out of the water. As a musician in touch with nature, he derives the inspiration for his works from the beauty of his surroundings. He records on location at such beauty spots as the Grand Canyon, the Olympic Rain forest, Yosemite, the deserts of the Southwest, and America's rugged western coastline.
Presently Paul resides in the San Diego area and is actively cataloguing his entire life's output of music, more than 30 albums released and more to be released in the future. He is a highly prolific composer and is currently preparing for the next phase of his music by multi-tracking large scale orchestral forces into a new holographic musical system that promises to bring his music to new dimensions of beauty in the emerging 21st Century music.
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