Spicer was born in Los Angeles, where he later graduated from Fairfax High School in 1942, and attended the University of Redlands from 1943-45.
Harvard University | Columbia University | Yale University | University of Paris | New York University | Stanford University | Princeton University | University of Cambridge | University of Pennsylvania | University of Michigan | University of Chicago | University of California, Berkeley | University of Toronto | Cornell University | University of Oxford | University of London | University of Oslo | Cambridge University | University of Southern California | McGill University | Johns Hopkins University | Northwestern University | University of California | Brown University | University of Queensland | University of Minnesota | University of Washington | University of Notre Dame | University College London | Duke University |
His academic work includes composition studies with Barney Childs at the University of Redlands and Lou Harrison, David Rosenboom, and Larry Polansky at Mills College.
In 1985 he worked at the Immanuel Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles in exchange with Samuel Swartz, and he has been teaching at the University of Redlands in California since 1986.
She has also served as a visiting poet at a number of colleges and universities, including the University of Redlands, Redlands, California; University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona; Boise State University, Boise, Idaho; Marylhurst University, Marylhurst, Oregon, and Milikin University, Decatur, Illinois.