Born Thomas Dubois Hormel in 1930, Tom has lived in California, Hawaii, Idaho and now Florida. Graduating from Occidental College with a BA in
Sociology, Tom also studied a year of Law at Loyola Law School, and a year of Architecture at USC. Tom speaks fluent French and Spanish with some swear words in three other languages. Tom’s brother Jim was Ambassador to Luxembourg under Bill Clinton.

Tom has been deeply involved in many environmental organizations and projects, most considerable of which includes: Conservation International, Tree People, Idaho Conservation League, and League of Conservation Voters. He has created numerous environmental projects including the E2 Environmental Education (with workbooks and environmental teacher training) that resulted in the first use of environmental textbooks in many high schools throughout the United States.

A recipient of the United Nations Environmental 500 award in Istanbul, Tom has been founder and principal donor of the Global Environment Project Institute, Global Action Network, Eastern Africa Environmental Network (co-founder), and Environmental Resource Center. Much of Tom’s life interest has been absorbed in creating music and art.

“Legend of Bird Mountain” came about in 1990, when members of The New York City Ballet (including director Jacques d’Amboise, lead dancer Christopher d’Amboise and other prominent dancers from New York City Ballet and The Joffrey Ballet) joined the Sun Valley Summer Arts Festival for a three-week class.

Prior to coming to the summer festival, Jacques d’Amboise, instigated a contest to select a local composer. With a four-minute composition that is included in the now 23:18 minute version of “Legend of Bird Mountain”, Tom Hormel was selected for the collaboration.

Tom has done other serious orchestral compositions, including “Go For Baroque”, which had its World Premiere performance at the Wilshire Theatre in Beverly Hills and also performed by the Cape Cod Symphony. Tom continues to write music and is focused on reorganizing several older compositions to be
orchestrated and/or choreographed.