 |
|
|
|
Schofield conducts Palestrina
at Stanford University Memorial Church |
David Schofield has been involved with the early music scene for many years, both in New York and on the West Coast. His particular interest and experience is the sacred repertory of the renaissance.
Today Schofield is involved in the formation of Sistine Voices, a new professional all-male vocal ensemble which he will direct. Sistine Voices replicates the performance practice of the Papal Chapel in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and performs the rich repertory sung for the Popes. He continues his work as General Editor of the NDC Editions for C.F. Peters Corporation , which provides scores of the renaissance repertory for modern usage. He currently serves as Music Director at St. Francis Lutheran Church and Organist and Master of the Schola for St. Savior's Anglican Community in San Francisco.
A distinctive, imaginative conductor, Schofield ably leads both large chorus and orchestra and small schola in a very varied repertory. He founded the Notre Dame Choir, an ensemble of select singers at Columbia University in New York in 1985 and has conducted numerous concerts with this ensemble. In 1988 he was appointed Chaplain’s Organist at Columbia University and Director of the Sacred Concerts, also at Columbia. He served as Music Director of the Ars Choralis Chorus and Orchestra from 1988-1990. He conducted the Schola Nova, a group dedicated to chant and organum from 1996-1999. In 1999, he left New York to become the Director of Music and Liturgy at St. Dominic’s Church and Music Director of the Arts at St. Dominic’s concert series in San Francisco. He has recorded for Cathedral Records conducting the New York Madrigal Singers and for Globe Records with The Musicians of St. Dominic’s.
Schofield, a concert organist and brilliant improviser, has championed the music of Charles Tournemire (1870-1939), an impressionist who made a sizable contribution to organ literature but who has remained relatively obscure. Recently, he was invited to play Tournemire’s music for the American Guild of Organists, and gave performances of Tournemire’s oeuvres at Grace Cathedral and the National Shrine of St. Francis in San Francisco. His performances of Tournemire’s seldom heard Sept Chorale-Poemes sur les Sept Paroles du Xrist at the Riverside Church and the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola in New York received much acclaim. He has improvised many times at the Nightwatch and Vespers concerts at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. He performed for the American Guild of Organists Organists Against AIDS benefit concerts. His Bach performances have been featured on National Public Radio’s Pipedreams.
Dr. Schofield attended the Manhattan School of Music, l’Université de Paris, Sorbonne and the University of Cincinnati, where he studied composition with Lukas Foss and John Corigliano, organ with John Walker and improvisation with McNeil Robinson.