David M. Arden

David M. Arden (born September 6, 1949) is an American concert pianist whose performing and recording career has focused predominantly on contemporary and American classical repertoire,[1] including premiere performances and first recordings of piano works by a number of notable contemporary composers, such as Henryk Górecki,[2] Luciano Berio,[3] Earle Brown,[4] Carson Kievman[5] and David Lang.

Arden went on to study with Aube Tzerko at UCLA (Los Angeles), Lucy Brown[12] at Peabody Conservatory of Music (Baltimore), Frederic Gevers at the Royal Flemish Music Conservatory (Antwerp, Belgium), and Aloys Kontarsky at the Cologne Musikhochschule (Cologne, Germany).

[13] Arden received his Concert Diploma (Hoger Diploma) from the Royal Flemish Music Conservatory in 1974 and subsequently won a number of awards: 1st place at the Tenuto-Young Virtuosos Competition (Brussels, Belgium);[14] 1st place at the Gaudeamus International Competition for Interpreters of Contemporary Music (Rotterdam, the Netherlands); and the Kranichsteiner Musikpreis[15] (Darmstadt, Germany).

[16] His commercial recordings have covered piano repertoire of George Gershwin,[17] Leonard Bernstein,[18] Samuel Barber,[19] André Previn,[20] Henryk Górecki,[21] Arvo Pärt,[22] Galina Ustvolskaya,[23] Luciano Berio,[24] Earle Brown[25] and Carson Kievman.

[31][32] In 2000, Arden established Keys to Achievement Foundation,[33] a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing public schools, particularly those serving low-income populations, with a cost-efficient music keyboard instruction program.