Sarah+Hopkins+-+James,+Doug,+Jess

__Sarah Hopkins__
__Biography:__ Sarah Hopkins is an Australian composer born in 1958. Hopkins is very well-known for her visionary music. She is a classical musician that plays cello, harmonic overtone singing, choir, hand bells and harmonic whirlies (she created). Hopkins’ has her own unique style of playing the cello. Sarah specializes and performs ‘natural’ noises on her cello. This includes earthy textures, ancient sounds and bird calls. She also specializes in harmonic whirlies creating intricate patterns, movements and rhythms creating a unique sound. Hopkins has a strong classical music background and has developed further to Holistic music.

Sarah Hopkins has toured internationally a nd nationally around the world and Australia performing her original music, running workshops for Holistic Music and Harmonic Overtone Singing as an artist in residence. Sarah has represented Australia for prestigious events in South East Asia, Europe and America since 1981 as an Australian culture ambassador. Some of these events include;
 * Germany World Expo in 2000
 * The Opening Ceremony of the 4th World Athletic Championships
 * In 2006 the New Zealand and Singapore Arts Festival

Some of her works include Blessings for World Peace, Honor the Earth as your mother and Reclaiming the spirit. Her piece, Life Melodies is the most performed Australian choral piece in the USA and has become a repertoire piece for many choirs around the world. Hopkins was commissioned by the Queensland Music Festival to compose one piece both for choir and an orchestra in 2003 and one piece in 2005. Both these two pieces went for 30 minutes. They were called ‘Childers Shining’ (2003 piece) and ‘Children s Shining: One World’ (2005 piece). Later afterwards Hopkins was honored for her piece, Children s Shining in 2003 by having a ne w rural housing estate near Childers named after her composition. Sarah Hopkins has produced three CD’s and in 2012 auditioned for Australia’s got Talent.



__Characteristics of music:__ Sarah Hopkins is most famous for her whirlies. This instrument is made from pool hoses. Hopkins uses these to create music by swinging them in the air in circles. She controls the pressure of the hose by tightening and releasing the intensity of which she holds the hose. This creates different pitch and duration of the notes that are produced from the whirlies.

Sarah Hopkins composes choral music and orchestral music. She also writes music for orchestral instruments. These instruments can be cello and violin. The pieces that Hopkins composes are rather slow and melodic.

__Recorded or Score Examples:__ __ [] __ __ [] __

__Analysis:__ Analysis of Kindred Spirits by James, Doug and Jess

__Gallery:__