Biography

Dave Soldier bios for concert programs

Dave Soldier played violin in Western swing bands and guitar in rhythm and blues groups, including Bo Diddley, and studied composition with Roscoe Mitchell before moving to New York City in 1981, where he studied with Otto Luening. In 1985, he founded the seminal punk chamber group, the Soldier String Quartet, followed by the punk Delta blues band, the Kropotkins. In addition to compositions for classical musicians ranging from solo works to two large operas, with conservationist Richard Lair, Soldier co-founded the Thai Elephant Orchestra, consisting of 16 elephants in Northern Thailand, for which he built giant musical instruments. He has coached children to compose their own music in Harlem (Da Hiphop Raskalz), Brooklyn (the Tangerine Awkestra), Washington Heights, and northern Guatemala. In addition to repertoire for these groups, Soldier’s compositions include The People’s Choice Music: the most wanted and unwanted songs, following poll results of likes and dislikes of the American population, a collaboration with artists Komar & Melamid; to song cycle collaborations with author Kurt Vonnegut; music on specially designed instruments by songbirds and pygmy chimpanzees; music performed by electrical brain activity in the Brainwave Music Project with Brad Garton: arrangements for John Cale, David Byrne, and Guided by Voices, and various song cycles /oratorios/ operas and TV and film soundtracks including I Shot Andy Warhol and Sesame Street, and has played on many pop, jazz, experimental, and classical recordings. Soldier received a Ph.D in neuroscience at Columbia University, where he is a professor in the Neurology, Psychiatry, and Neuroscience departments. His book "Music Math and Mind" on the physics and neuroscience of music is published by Columbia University Press (2021).

Short bio for press

Composer Dave Soldier's projects include the Thai Elephant Orchestra consisting of 14 elephants in northern Thailand, the cult Delta punk band the Kropotkins, The People's Choice (The World's Most Unwanted Music), the Soldier String Quartet, the Brainwave Music Project, and coaching children to compose their own music in Harlem, Brooklyn, and Guatemala. He has performed as violinist, guitarist, and composer/ arranger with Bo Diddley, John Cale, Kurt Vonnegut, and many others, appearing on over 100 CDs, including nearly 20 featuring his compositions for classical and jazz musicians.

Combined music & science bio

Dave Soldier leads a double life as a musician and a neuroscientist. As composer, he cofounded (with conservationist Richard Lair) the Thai Elephant Orchestra, 14 elephants for whom he built giant instruments and who released 3 CDs, and projects with children, including rural Guatemala (Yol Ku: Mayan Mountain Music) and New York's East Harlem (Da HipHop Raskalz). His Soldier String Quartet helped usher the use of hiphop, R&B, and punk rock into classical music in the 1980s, and his long-running Memphis/New York Delta punk band, the Kropotkins, is a cult favorite. His composed The People's Choice Music: the most wanted and unwanted songs, following poll results of likes and dislikes of the American population, with artists Komar & Melamid; song cycle/oratorios in collaborations with Kurt Vonnegut, and many chamber and classical works. As a performer and arranger, he worked with John Cale, Bo Diddley, Van Dyke Parks, David Byrne, and many jazz and avant garde acts, appearing on over 100 albums and films on violin, guitar, or arranger. The Violinist, is a film/theater work of his pieces for violin and piano (starring Rebecca Cherry, produced by Winsome Brown).

As David Sulzer, he is a neuroscientist and Professor at Columbia University in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neurology. Sulzer's lab investigates the synapses of the cortex and basal ganglia including the dopamine system, in habit formation, planning, and decision making. His lab and collaborators have made major contributions to understanding the action of addictive drugs and causes of diseases including Parkinson's, Huntington's and autism. They developed the first methods to directly measure the fundamental unit of neurotransmission (quantal neurotransmitter release) and the first optical method to visualize neurotransmission at the synaptic level in the brain (by developing fluorescent false neurotransmitters).

A few projects unite these personalities. With computer musician Brad Garton, he initiated the Brainwave Music Project, which allows musicians to perform using their brain's electrical activity and teaches audiences about the nervous system. With chemist Roald Hoffmann, he ran the monthly science meets art series, Entertaining Science, at the Cornelia Street Cafe. And he has a series of new pieces that use mathematic transformations including fractals and calculus to create new repertoire, such as a 20 minute version of Chopin's Minute Waltz.

Detailed biography prepared for Music Math and Mind

Dave Sulzer is a Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology, and Pharmacology. His laboratory investigates the synapses of the cortex and basal ganglia including the dopamine system, and their roles in habit formation, planning, and decision making. They have made contributions to understanding the action of addictive drugs and causes of diseases including Parkinson's, Huntington's and autism and important contributions to neuroimmunology and chemistry. They developed the first method to directly measure the fundamental unit of neurotransmission (quantal neurotransmitter release) and the first optical methods to visualize neurotransmission at the synaptic level in the brain (fluorescent false neurotransmitters). He founded the Dopamine Society, the Gordon Conference on Parkinsonï¿½s Disease, and has published research in Science, Nature, and other prominent journals that have been cited more than 40,000 times in the scientific literature.

He played violin and the guitar while growing up in Minnesota, Illinois, and Connecticut, and as a teenager began to tour in country, rock and rhythm, western swing and blues bands. He attended Michigan State where he studied plant genetics while studying composition privately with Roscoe Mitchell. He studied plant breeding at the University of Florida and played guitar in rhythm and blues groups including with Bo Diddley prior to moving to New York where he performed in salsa, experimental and classical groups and received a scholarship to attend Columbia University for a Ph.D. in biology. While there he studied composition privately with Otto Luening and at night at the Juilliard School.

As his contemporary music group, the Soldier String Quartet, became better known, he changed his musical name to Dave Soldier to avoid being thrown out of graduate school. The Quartet pioneered the fusion of classical, punk rock and hip-hop styles in albums of Soldierï¿½s compositions, performing at venues ranging from the punk rock club CBGBs to Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, and from 1984-2004 the group premiered over 100 compositions including major works by Teo Macero, Leroy Jenkins, Phill Niblock, Zeena Parkins, Fred Frith, Terry Riley, Elliott Sharp, Alvin Curran, Charles Mingus and Ivan Wyschnegrasky. The group provided a training ground for performers including violinists Regina Carter and Todd Reynolds. The Quartet also recorded with many rock, pop and jazz acts including Guided by Voices, Jessie Harris, Butch Morris, Tony Williams (Miles Davis), Lambchop, Bob Neuwirth, John Cale (with whom they toured from 1992-1998), Bill Laswell, Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Amina Claudine Myers, the Plastic People of the Universe, Van Dyke Parks (the Beach Boys), Guided by Voices, Rufus Wainwright, Joanne Brackeen, Myra Melford, Sussan Deyhim, and Lenny Picket.

Dave further worked as a violinist, guitarist, producer and arranger in a broad variety of pop, jazz, experimental, world music and classical styles including John Cale (Velvet Underground), David Byrne (Talking Heads), Ric Ocasek (the Cars), Richard Hell (the Voidoids), Robert Dick, Bob Neuwirth, Lee Renaldo (Sonic Youth), Henry Threadgill, William Hooker, Billy Bang, Marshall Allen (the Sun Ra Arkestra), Pedro Cortes, Pete Seeger, William Parker, Roy Campbell and Eliza Carthy and with the classic record producers Teo Macero, Giorgio Gomelsky, and Joe Boyd. He founded the cult Memphis/New York punk band, the Kropotkins with singer Lorette Velvette, a group that recorded four albums and included Mo Tucker (Velvet Underground). He performs in in a duo with drummer Jonathan Kane (Swans, LaMonte Young, February).

Dave arranged the scores for film including Eat and Kiss (Andy Warhol) I Shot Andy Warhol (Mary Harron) and Basquiat (Julian Schnabel) with John Cale. He wrote soundtracks for the TV show Sesame Street, and the black and white silent film The Violinist (Winsome Brown) is based on his compositions for violin and piano.

As a composer for classical musicians, his work includes the operas Naked Revolution with the Russian painters Komar and Melamid, and The Eighth Hour of Amduat which features opera singers and orchestra with Marshall Allen of the Sun Ra Arkestra. He composed two oratorios (Ice-9 Ballads and A Soldierï¿½s Story) with author Kurt Vonnegut, who performs on the original recordings. His album Chamber Music was named by the New York Times as a top classical recording of the year. His compositions are recorded by the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, the Absolut Ensemble, the PubliQuartet, violinists Miranda Cuckson, Regina Carter and Rebecca Cherry, cellist Erik Friedlander, singers Eliza Carthy, Shelly Hirsch and Amina Claudine Myers, accordionist William Schimmel, pianists Steven Beck and Christopher Oï¿½Riley, organist Walter Hilse and flutist Robert Dick.

Many of his projects are unusual collaborations, including the Thai Elephant Orchestra with conservationist Richard Lair, an orchestra consisting of 14 elephants at the Thai Elephant Conservation Center, who recorded three CDs: The Peopleï¿½s Choice Music: the most wanted and unwanted songs, following poll results of likes and dislikes of the American population, with artists Komar & Melamid; coaching musically naï¿½ve children to compose their own music in Harlem (Da Hiphop Raskalz), Brooklyn (the Tangerine Awkestra), Washington Heights (Matarile), and Northern Guatemala (Yol Ku: Mayan Mountain Music); music performed by electroencephalography of brain activity in the Brainwave Music Project with computer musician Brad Garton, a project that has been featured on PBS and BBC TV with Stewart Copeland (the Police); and music played on specially created instruments by songbirds and bonobos.

Bio for the book Music Math and Mind (2021, Columbia University Press)

DAVE SOLDIER leads a double life as a musician and a scientist. As composer, he developed repertoire for groups including the Thai Elephant Orchestra, 14 elephants for whom he built giant instruments and who released 3 CDs, and projects with children, including rural Guatemala (Yol Ku: Mayan Mountain Music) and New York's East Harlem (Da HipHop Raskalz). His Soldier String Quartet helped usher the use of hiphop, R&B, and punk rock into classical music in the 1980s, and his long-running Memphis/New York Delta punk band, the Kropotkins, is a cult favorite. His composed The People's Choice Music: the most wanted and unwanted songs, following poll results of likes and dislikes of the American population, with artists Komar & Melamid; song cycle/oratorios in collaborations with Kurt Vonnegut, and many chamber and classical works. As a performer and arranger, he worked with John Cale, Bo Diddley, Van Dyke Parks, David Byrne, and many jazz and avant garde acts, appearing on over 100 albums and films on violin, guitar, or arranger. A theater/performance film, The Violinist , is a current work. Soldier studied composition privately with Roscoe Mitchell and Otto Luening.

As David Sulzer, he is a neuroscientist and Professor at Columbia University in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neurology. A few projects unite these personalities. With computer musician Brad Garton, he initiated the Brainwave Music Project, which allows musicians to perform using their brain's electrical activity and teaches audiences about the nervous system. With chemist Roald Hoffmann, he runs a monthly science meets art series, Entertaining Science, at the Cornelia Street Cafe. And he has a series of new pieces that use mathematic transformations including fractals and calculus to create new repertoire, such as a 20 minute version of Chopin's Minute Waltz.