School of Music Visiting Artist Series
Music: David Lopato’s music reflects an involvement with such diverse forms as modern jazz, stride piano, avant-garde classical music, blues, latin and various world musics, most notably those of Indonesia, where he has lived and studied Javanese gamelan. His love of these seemingly disparate traditions has resulted in a body of music that is both universal and personal. Although his main instrument is piano, his interest in other, more exotic timbres has led him to explore new techniques for "preparing" the piano, as well as incorporate other percussion instruments and electronics into his work. He has worked extensively with computers, MIDI, and related digital media to facilitate the creation and realization of his own music and that of other musicians. David Lopato was born in 1954 in Brooklyn, NY. His studies include a B.A. in music composition from Yale University, graduate work in African drumming at California Institute of the Arts and Javanese gamelan at Akademie Seni Krawitan Indonesia in Surakarta, Java as a Fulbright Scholar. He has performed his own compositions throughout the world as a soloist, leader of his own trio, quintet and ten-piece ensembles.