About me
Derek David (vocals) is a composer, conductor, and music educator based in Boston, Massachusetts. His dramatic and vibrant music has been performed in both Europe and the United States and has received great recognition from audiences and critics alike. Since his first String Quartet (2011) – described as “a true musical jewel of the 21st Century – Derek has been the recipient of the EAMA Nadia Boulanger Institute Prize (2011), the Morton Gould ASCAP Award (2011), first place in the 2015 American Prize in Composition–Chamber Music, and the 2018 SFCM Hoefer Prize. He has been commissioned by the Juventas Ensemble, SAKURA Cello Quintet, Del Sol Quartet the Verona Quartet, the Sonica Quartet, The Sounding Board, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music New Music Ensemble, and the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. Derek is currently the musical director and conductor of ‘A Besere Velt’ – אַ בעסערע װעלט, one of three choirs in the world dedicated to the performance and preservation of Yiddish repertoire. Derek studied composition at The San Francisco Conservatory of Music and received Masters and Doctoral degrees from The New England Conservatory. Previously a Teaching Fellow at Harvard University and five-time recipient of its Distinction in Teaching Award, he is now Lecturer in Music at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His areas of interest extend to Medieval theory and musicology, the Beatles, and music of the Yiddish world.
