Biography
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Born
20 January 1926
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Born In
Philadelphia, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, United States
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Died
13 August 1996 (aged 70)
David Tudor was an American pianist and composer of experimental music. He studied piano with Stefan Wolpe and became known as one of the leading performers of avant garde piano music. He gave the first American performance of the Piano Sonata No. 2 by Pierre Boulez in 1950, and a European tour in 1954 greatly enhanced his reputation. Karlheinz Stockhausen dedicated his Klavierstück VI (1955) to Tudor. Tudor also gave early performances of works by Morton Feldman and La Monte Young.
The composer with which Tudor is particularly associated is John Cage. He gave the premiere of Cage's Music of Changes, Concerto For Piano and Orchestra and the notorious 4' 33". Cage said that many of his pieces were written either specifically for Tudor to perform or with him in mind. The two worked closely together on many of Cage's pieces, both works for piano and electronic pieces. Upon Cage's death in 1992, Tudor took over as music director of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company.
Tudor is also highly regarded as a composer of live electronic music, building his idiosyncratic electronic instruments from scratch and influencing generations of electronic performers.
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