David Dolan BMus MA PhD


David Dolan's career is now focused on two combined activities: the more traditional one as a concert pianist, and the other, which introduces classical improvisation through his teaching and masterclasses as well as his concerts. Where appropriate he improvises cadenzas to the concerti he performs, invites the audience to give him themes on which he then extemporizes a fantasia, sometimes simultaneously with other partners.

Born in Israel, David Dolan studied at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem where he obtained his BMus (First Prize) with the late Prof. Sonia Valin as well as the ‘Artist Diploma - Summa Cum Laude'. He studied composition and improvisation with Prof. Haim Alexander. He then studied with Leon Fleischer, at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and with Claude Frank in New York. In 1977 he took part in Arthur Rubinstein's Class in Jerusalem.

David Dolan has performed as a soloist and in chamber music concerts in Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Holland, Italy, Israel, Switzerland and the USA, as well as in live recordings and broadcasting for several European radio stations.

Yehudi Menuhin’s reaction to his solo CD ‘When Interpretation and Improvisation get together’, dedicated to works influenced by and including improvisations, was: ‘David Dolan is giving new life to classical music’.

David Dolan is also a professor of piano, chamber music and Interpretation through Improvisation at the Yehudi Menuhin School of Music. He is frequently invited to give masterclasses in music centres such as Bloomington (Indiana), Paris and Geneva conservatoires, The Rubin Music Academy in Jerusalem, the Tchaikovsky Conservatoire, Moscow and the Julliard School.

Photo: Daniel Morozinski