Biography

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Still in his twenties, composer, violinist, and conductor David Fulmer is quickly emerging as one of the most unique musicians of his generation - his bold compositional aesthetic combined with his thrilling performing abilities have garnered him numerous international accolades. He is the winner of the 14^th International Edvard Grieg Competition for Composers; the first American ever to receive this highly acclaimed award. He has also been a winner of an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award, a BMI Composer Award, and was recently presented the prestigious Charles Ives Award (Scholarship) from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Other honors and awards include a special citation from the Minister of Education of Brazil for his cycle of musical lectures and presentation, the Hannah Komanoff Scholarship in Composition (2006-07) and the 2005 Dorothy Hill Klotzman Grant from the Juilliard School, and the highly coveted 2004 George Whitefield Chadwick Gold Medal from the New England Conservatory.

This season Fulmer made his European debut with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra performing and recording his Violin Concerto under the direction of Matthias Pintscher.  After rave reviews following the premiere of his Concerto at Lincoln Center, Fulmer was immediately engaged to perform the work with major orchestras and festivals throughout Europe, North American, Scandinavia, and Australia.  Upcoming performances of his music will be featured at the Grieg Festival in Oslo, the Mozarteum Summer Festival in Salzburg, Heidelberger Frühling Internationales Musikfestival, Tanglewood Music Center, and numerous others. Current commissioned projects include a new violin concerto, Vor dem Morgengrauen, for Ole Bøhn and the Sydney Conservatorium (Sydney, Australia; "101 Commissions for 100 Years Project"), a cello concerto for celebrated cellist Fred Sherry, a song cycle for Tony Arnold on texts by James Fenton, a clarinet quintet for the Phoenix Ensemble, and a saxophone quintet for the JACK Quartet.  His extended, hour-long triptych saxophone concerto, "On Night", composed for saxophone and ensemble for Eliot Gattegno, will be featured this upcoming season by the Argento New Music Project.  The work will open the Moving Sounds Festival in New York City this September, and be featured at the Czech Center and Austrian Cultural Forum.  "On Night" will be recorded for commercial release on the Tzadik label along with his Violin Concerto.

He appears regularly and records often with the premiere new music ensembles Speculum Musicae, the Group for Contemporary Music, the New York New Music Ensemble, and also with the Second Instrumental Unit, an ensemble that he co-founded and directs. He has appeared recently on the Great Performers Series at Lincoln Center, Live from Lincoln Center broadcasts, and the Center’s annual festivals; performing concerti, chamber music, and solo works. As the violist of the Zukofsky Quartet, Fulmer tours often performing the pioneering program of the complete string quartets of Milton Babbitt. He is a founding member of the Axiom Ensemble, and has been a member of the New Juilliard Ensemble for seven years. He has made over a dozen recordings as a violinist and violist for Albany, Koch International, Naxos, Mode, and Neuma recording labels.

His ensemble, the Second Instrumental Unit, has appeared as an ensemble-in-residence at over two dozen of the finest universities and conservatories, astonishingly commissioning and premiering over 200 works thus far in its triumphant six years. The Unit has traveled internationally on numerous occasions to many parts of Europe, South America, and Canada. Mr. Fulmer leads the ensemble in over fifty performances annually.

Fulmer recently received his doctorate from Juilliard, where he studied composition with Milton Babbitt and violin with Robert Mann. In 2009, Fulmer was appointed to the faculty of Columbia University.

In addition to academic and performing engagements, he regularly presents lectures on myriad musical topics around the globe, with recent appearances at the Philadelphia Modern Languages Association Conference; International Society of the Arts, Mathematics, and Architecture (Germany); BRIDGES International Mathematics Conference (Maryland); Banff Centre; Hildegard Von Bingen Society.

Fulmer performs on a variety of fine instruments, including violins by Gaetano Gadda and Douglas Cox, a viola by Gigli Romanus on loan to him from The Juilliard School, and bows by Benoit Rolland and F.N. Voirin.