David Friend

David Friend, Center for Career Readiness and Community Impact

David Friend is taking piano performance in new directions. As chamber musician, soloist, and in interdisciplinary projects, he is dedicated to projects that push boundaries and explore new ideas about what contemporary pianism can be in the twenty-first century. A fearless performer, critics have described his performances as “astonishingly compelling” (Washington Post), “magical” (New York Concert Review), and the New York Times calls him one “of the finest, busiest pianists active in New York’s contemporary-classical scene.” His playing is featured on Third Coast Percussion’s album of music by Steve Reich, which won the Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance..

He has performed at major venues around the world including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Royal Festival Hall (London), and the National Centre for the Performing Arts (Beijing), and in major festivals including the Lincoln Center Festival, Mostly Mozart Festival, Aspen Music Festival, Gilmore International Keyboard Festival, Prague Spring Festival, CTM Festival, and the Bang on a Can Marathon.

David Friend has performed with respected ensembles such as Ensemble Signal, Alarm Will Sound, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and the Bang on a Can All-Stars, and he is a founding member of TRANSIT New Music, Bent Duo, Hotel Elefant, and Grand Band, NYC’s piano sextet super-group. He collaborates extensively with living composers and has worked with some of the most notable composers of our time including Pulitzer prizewinners Steve Reich, Julia Wolfe, David Lang, Steven Stucky, and Charles Wuorinen. He has recorded for the New Amsterdam, Harmonia Mundi, Albany, Dacapo, Cedille, Innova, a wave press, and New World labels, and his performances have been broadcast nationally on radio programs such as NPR’s Performance Today, WQXR’s Hammered!, and WNYC’s New Sounds.

As a soloist, David Friend is noted for his charismatic performances and his thoughtful programming. By developing compelling solo programming and engaging meaningfully with the audience, he brings a twenty-first century approach to the nineteenth-century concept of the piano recital.