Eric McCarl - Composer

Richard and Norma McCarl became the proud parents of Richard Eric McCarl on October 8, 1958 at 9:09 a.m. Growing up in the then small town of State College, Pennsylvania, Eric began playing violin at the age of seven under the tutelage of Donald E. Hopkins of the Alard String Quartet. At eight he began composing his own original songs on the piano. Over the next ten years, Eric studied many instruments simultaneously -- the piano, viola, cello, string bass, trumpet, coronet, French horn, tuba, trombone, guitar, electric guitar, electric bass and drums. During high school and college Eric played keyboards and sang both lead and background vocals in many different bands - Skylark, Lazy Daze, Full House, to mention a few.
Eric graduated from Penn State in 1981 with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science with a minor in Music Composition. After college he spent a number of years in corporate America in the computer industry – yet, he never stopped writing, composing and playing. He lived and worked in Dallas, Manhattan Beach and Los Angeles. These cities afforded Eric the ability to compose and perform his music while holding his every man day job. Hungry for input from some of the best musicians in the world, Eric applied and was accepted to Berklee College of Music in Boston. Eric traveled from west coast to east coast with the intention of studying at Berklee. Once he arrived in Boston, he quickly came to the realization that the 'education' he was looking for was not in a classroom, and could only be found by developing the musical ideas that were deep inside his heart. He never attended a day of class at Berklee, and instead returned to the west coast. Once back in Los Angeles in 1987, Eric literally spent all of his waking hours either performing or in the recording studio After exiting stage left the corporate world, it took Eric just three months to establish his own independent record label -- Weaving Libra Records. The label’s foremost mission is to sign quality Artists who compose original, contemplative, thought-evoking solo music. With an architectural - media perfect design by Kent Christiansen of Studio Science, construction began on Eric's Olive Tree Studio in April 2001. It was completed in landmark time. After the studio finishing touches and sound systems tests were completed to his exacting satisfaction, in January 2002 Eric recorded two of the three solo piano CDs that will comprise the Trilogy of Light. The first CD, Seeking the Light Within, was released June 12, 2002. Pleased with the music, yet striving to reach a broader listening audience, Eric hired Ed Bonk of Lazz Promotions to promote his CD to radio stations all over the world that played New Age music. On December 1, 2003, Eric re-released his debut CD under the title Seeking The Light. Seeking The Light debuted at number 4 on the new age charts (according to the New Age Reporter) for December 2003. Then, 40 years to the day after the young boy Eric watched the Beatles perform on the Ed Sullivan show, Eric awoke to find that his debut CD Seeking The Light sat at number 1 atop the New Age music charts for the month of January 2004. To Eric, this signified the end of one journey and the beginning of another. Artist Eric McCarl has the immense joy of sharing his music with all of us - so that we too can find the Source within to feed our life intentions