A native of Highland Park, Illinois, David B. Halperin joined the United States Air Force Academy Band in Colorado Springs, CO as a clarinetist in January 2021. In July, he won the Second Clarinet position with the Fort Collins Symphony. He comes to Colorado after serving with the US Air Force regional bands, stationed at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, VA and Ramstein Air Base, Germany. While there, he was able to perform chamber music across Europe and Africa in countries including Angola, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Italy, Niger, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Tanzania, and was a featured soloist on multiple occasions with the National Presidential Orchestra of Ukraine.
Prior to his Air Force career, David was a freelance clarinetist in the Chicagoland area, and has performed with the Symphony Orchestras of Milwaukee, Jacksonville, Virginia, Richmond (VA), and New Mexico, as well as the New World Symphony in Florida. He received fellowships to the Aspen Musical Festival and School and the Brevard Music Center, attended the Aria International Summer Academy, and the Las Vegas and Hot Springs Music Festivals, and can also be heard as Principal Clarinet of the Ohio Light Opera on the first complete CD recording of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Sorcerer, released by Albany Records.
David holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a Master of Music degree from the Bienen School of Music at Northwestern University. Aside from music, he enjoys photography and travel and has, so far, visited 70 countries on 6 continents.
