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Recognized for his “masterful artistry” (The Diapason, 2019), David Baskeyfield has earned a reputation for creative programing, showcasing an astonishing facility tempered by intelligent interpretation, and informed above all by intuitive and communicative musicality. Listeners have noted compelling rhythmic drive, uncanny command of registration, and incisive articulation coupled to a soaring legato.

 

He has recorded on ATMA Classique and Acis. His latest album features the music of the legendary performer and composer Marcel Dupré, including the US premiere of a previously unpublished orchestral transcription. It was recorded on the influential organ of 1932 at the church of St. Mary the Virgin, Times Square: the first American organ to experiment with French voicing, this is an ideal instrument for the music of a Frenchman whose name was made famous worldwide through a series of American tours. Choir and Organ (2020) noted "astounding virtuosity and musicality.”

 

Baskeyfield was an organ scholar at St John’s College, Oxford, where he read Law. Graduate work followed at the Eastman School of Music, where his doctoral research explored the boundary between written composition and improvisation among the Parisian organist-composers taught by Vierne and Dupré. The recipient of an unusual number of awards in playing competitions, he earned first prize at the Canadian International Organ Competition (incidentally taking three other prizes), St. Albans, Miami, and the AGO National Competition in Organ Improvisation, all with audience prize.

 

He has been broadcast a number of times on American Public Media’s Pipedreams, as well as NPR’s With Heart and Voice and, more locally, as part of the daily playlist on classical station WXXI. 

 

Aside from solo performance he enjoys work as a collaborative pianist, continuo player, and occasional cocktail pianist. Current interests include vegetable gardening, beekeeping, sports fishing and aquarium fish, in particular the cichlids endemic to the east African rift lakes, Malawi and Tanganyika, and, lately, a reef tank. Currently living close to Rochester, NY, he is translating a number of writings by Dupré and Rolande Falcinelli held at the Sibley Music Library. He shares his house with two springer spaniels, named Lucy and Wilbur.

 

 He is represented in North America by Karen McFarlane Artists, Inc.