David Alexander
horn
Acting Principal, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; University of Cincinnati – College-Conservatory of Music
DAVID ALEXANDER currently serves as Acting Principal Horn of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Previously Acting Associate Principal in the same orchestra, he has also held positions in the Metropolitan Opera and New World Symphony, and has played as a guest musician with ensembles around the world including the Houston Symphony and Paris’ Les Arts Florissants.
Outside the orchestra, Alexander finds fulfillment in a wide variety of chamber music. He has appeared at Carnegie Hall with the Met Orchestra Chamber Ensemble and toured in China with Juilliard’s Kovner Wind Quintet. He has focused on contemporary music at the Yellow Barn Music Festival, specialized in historically informed performance at the French baroque festival, Dans le Jardins de William Christie, and most recently collaborated with the indie rock band WHY? in Cincinnati’s Talk Low Music Festival. Alexander performed as a Fellow at the Colorado College Summer Music Festival, Britten-Pears Young Artists Programme, Music Academy of the West, and Bowdoin International Music Festival. Among his most memorable experiences on stage, his brass quintet, AES V, collaborated with Mikhail Baryshnikov to produce the first choreographed performance of Leonard Bernstein’s Dance Suite for Brass Quintet for the Bernstein Centennial in 2018.
Alexander has served on the adjunct faculty of the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music since 2024. He has given masterclasses there as well as at the University of Houston, the China Conservatory of Music, Medellín’s Iberacademy, and Yamaha Ginza in Tokyo. Alexander received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Juilliard School, where he was a proud recipient of the Kovner Fellowship. His primary teachers include Julie Landsman, Jennifer Montone, Robert Johnson, Michelle Baker, Todd Williams, and Marie Lickwar.