Author Biography
Walt Whitman (1819-1892) revolutionized American poetry through the eleven editions of his magnum opus,Leaves of Grass, a celebration of the dynamism and diversity of a still-young America. Drum-Taps, first published in 1865, was written out of his experience as a nurse during the Civil War. It is a collection, he once wrote in a letter to a friend, put together by fits and starts, on the field, in the hospitals as I worked with the soldier boys. Lawrence Kramer is an author and composer who has often addressed Whitman's poetry in both capacities. He has set several of the poems from Drum-Taps to music and edited the essay collection Walt Whitman and Modern Music. Kramer is Distinguished Professor of English and Music at Fordham University.
