david kaplan

David Kaplan, pianist, has been called “excellent and adventurous” by The New York Times, and praised by the Boston Globe for “grace and fire” at the keyboard. He has appeared as soloist with the Britten Sinfonia at London’s Barbican Centre, at Miami’s Arscht Center with Itzhak Perlman, and in recital at the Ravinia Festival, Sarasota Opera House, Washington’s National Gallery, Music on Main in Vancouver, and Strathmore in Baltimore. This season, he makes his debut at the Berlin Philharmonie, performing Beethoven’s Concerto no. 3 with the Berlin Sinfonie Orchester.

Kaplan’s New Dances of the League of David, a recital infusing Schumann’s Davidsbündlertänze with 16 new works by composers including Augusta Read Thomas, Marcos Balter, Caroline Shaw, and Andrew Norman was cited among the “Best Classical Music Performances of 2015”  by  The New York Times. For a new program called Chaconne, music Beethoven, Brahms, Ligeti, Rzewski and Gubaidulina will accompany two new works from Anthony Cheung and Christopher Cerrone, to be premiered in 2019.

Balancing solo performances with meaningful collaborations, Kaplan has played with the Attacca, Ariel, Enso, Hausman, and Tesla String Quartets. As a core member of Decoda, the Affiliate Ensemble of Carnegie Hall, he performs frequently in New York’s most exciting venues, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to National Sawdust, as well as creating innovative residencies as far away as Abu Dhabi, Mexico, and Scotland. He is a veteran of numerous distinguished chamber music festivals and series, such as the Seattle Chamber Music, Bard, and Mostly Mozart Festivals, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Chamber Music Northwest, and Barge Music. He is an alumnus of Tanglewood, Ravinia-Steans Institute, and the Perlman Music Program. He is the Artistic Director of Lyrica Chamber Music, a community series in Morris County, NJ currently in its 31st season.

Kaplan has recorded for Naxos, as well as with Timo Andres in the acclaimed disc, Shy and Mighty (2010), for Nonesuch. Kaplan’s distinguished mentors over the years include the late Claude Frank, Walter Ponce, Alfred Brendel, Richard Goode, and Emanuel Ax. He studied conducting at the Universität der Künste Berlin with Lutz Köhler, under the auspices of a Fulbright Fellowship from 2008-2010. The recipient of a DMA from Yale University in 2014, Kaplan also graduated from UCLA, where he is now Lecturer in Piano for 2016-18.

David is proud to be a Yamaha Artist, and when at home in New York City, he enjoys practicing on his childhood piano, a 1908 Hamburg Steinway model A. Away from the keyboard, he loves cartooning and cooking, and is mildly obsessed with classic cars.