"I was first called to a life in music by Sunday radio broadcasts of concerts and opera with which my mother ans sister would sing along throughout the house. The gramaphone and radio also introduced me to ragtime, early jazz, swing bands, country western and popular song.

"I first participated in music making as a boy soprano from age six until my voice changed whereupon I switched to the bass section of the choir and sang in it until going off to college.

One day at the piano in the "back bedroom" where I was supposed to be practicing for my weekly piano lesson with Evelyn White but, bored with that, had drifted into endless improvisations, my younger sister opened the door and said, 'You're just making that up as you go along.' She was right! and that's what I've been doing ever since - just making it up."

Stokes was born in Haddon Heights New Jersey, about ten miles southeast of Philadelphia. His mother was a fine vocalist and the early artistic influence in his life. Stokes studied piano at an early age and began composing on his own in high school. He held degrees in music from Lawrence College in Appleton Wisconsin, the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, and the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where he taught for 29 years.

While at the University of Minnesota, Stokes founded the school’s electronic music laboratory and championed the development of contemporary music by starting the First Minnesota Moving and Storage Warehouse Band. His early compositions were tonal and lyrical while his later compositions were more heavily influenced by Charles Ives, John Cage, and Henry Brandt and used American music idioms and unconventional sounds in juxtaposed styles.

Eric Stokes can be remembered for his orchestral and chamber music as well as several operas, the first of which, Horspfal, made an indelible impression on those who saw the Minnesota Opera production of it in 1969. Some of Stokes' works contain a dramatic element and can be considered as theater pieces. His Rock and Roll  (Phonic Paradigm I) calls for rocks to be hit together and rolled across the stage. Often his music focused on the natural world or environmental issues. His compositions were a  reflection of his life and personality: eccentric, often humorous, sometimes satirical but also filled with a deeply felt, almost Romantic, expressiveness.

Eric Stokes, Composer, 1930 - 1999.

A complete list of works by Eric Stokes is listed here.