David’s Music at a Glance



Site is in Progress

  • Upcoming performance:
    ––November 12th, 2026 in Boston, The Other Side of Air, A Celebration in Poetry & Music of the Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, Sitar with poet & translator Mark Burrows, Follen Church, Lexington, MA

  • Performances with poets and authors in the past few years, partial list:
    ––Sitar with poet Jane Hirshfield, First Parish Church, Cambridge, MA
    ––Sitar with author Mirabai Starr, Boston, MA
    ––Sitar with poet Li-Young Lee, East Carolina University, North Carolina
    ––Sitar with theologian Matthew Fox, Boston, MA

  • Performance with tabla:
    ––Sitar with Pandit Shantilal Shah, tabla, streamed by Lexington, MA Community Education

Recent & Upcoming Performances

  • Recent sitar & poetry programs:
    ––Vidyapati: The Season of Love & Honey, Sitar & Poetry, streamed by Lexington, MA Community Education
    ––Kabir: Rivers of Light, Sitar & Poetry, Macalester College
    ––Vidyapati: The Season of Love & Honey, Sitar & Poetry, Carleton College

Hearing Malady

  • Hyperacusis
    ––In 2004 David developed hyperacusis, so that sound causes pain. Caused by a lifetime of music, this then sharply curtailed all music activity for years. It has been a bit better recently and David has been able to function a bit more normally. In respect to sound anyway!

  • College & private:
    —Carleton College, Senior Lecturer, Northfield, MN
    —Macalester College, Saint Paul, MN
    —Private, Minneapolis, MN

Teaching

Sitar Performance

  • Partial List
    —Town Hall, New York
    —Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco
    —Gandhi Center, Washington, DC
    ––Harvard University, Boston
    —Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
    —O’Shaughnessy Auditorium, Saint Paul
    —Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis
    ––Follen Church, Lexington, MA
    ––Kansas City, Kansas
    —London, England
    —Granada Theater, Santa Barbara
    ––Jung Society, Philadelphia
    ––New School, New York City
    ––Guthrie Theater Company, Minneapolis
    —National Public Radio
    ––Scottish Rite Temple, San Francisco
    ––Minnesota Public Radio (Interview)
    ––Follen Church, Lexington, MA

Western Composition
Teaching

Western Compositions Performed

  • Opera, partial list
    ––White Nights, opera excerpts; performed live on Minnesota Public Radio by the Rochester Symphony & Chorus
    ––Ashoka, opera; recorded vocalists, virtual orchestra, & bharatanatyam dance, O’Shaughnessy, Saint Paul, MN

  • Chorus & Orchestra, partial list
    ––Canticle, chorus & orchestra; live vocalists, virtual orchestra & bharatanatyam dance, O’Shaughnessy, Saint Paul, MN

  • Chamber Music, partial list
    ––Triumph of Truth & Time; trumpet & organ, University of Minnesota Trumpet Ensemble, Basilica of St. Mary, Minneapolis, MN

Brief Bio
Hyperacusis

Sitar of Note

  • —David’s sitar was for years part of the introduction of MPRs World News Program.
    ––On the occasion of Ravi Shankar’s passing, NPR called David to interview him about sitar in the United States.
    ––David’s endorsement of Rikhi Ram sitars is listed by premier maker Rikhi Ram under “Blessings from Legends,” along with Pandit Ravi Shankar, Ustad Shujaat Khan, and others.
    ––David was called upon by Ustad Vilayat Khansahib to file his sitar javari (overhaul sound) prior to his concert in Carnegie Hall to celebrate the bicentennial of India’s Independence.

  • From way back in another life, partial list
    —Town Hall, New York
    —Avery Fischer Hall, Lincoln Center, New York
    —Cooper Union, New York
    ––Brooklyn Symphony, Brooklyn, NY
    ––Greenwich Village Chamber Orchestra, New York
    ––New York City Opera
    ––Bennington Chamber Music Festival of the East
    ––Columbia University Orchestra, Fly With Me, LP record of the only musical ever written by Rogers, Hart and Hammerstein

David’s Music Training Partial List

  • Shagird, “Emperor of Sitar” Ustad Vilayat Khan

  • Student for five years of “One of the Ten Best Horn Players of All Time,” New York Philharmonic Solo Horn, Philip Meyers

Horn Performance

Resume

Sitar & Poetry
Composition Western
Composition India

Purchase recordings of

David’s Sitar with poets

Robert Bly & Coleman

Barks

Rumi Voice of Longing

In the seven centuries since the death of Jelaluddin Rumi in 1273, the world has come to know and thrill to his sacred poetry. In concert with David Whetstone, sitar, and Marcus Wise, tabla, his writing is part of a religious tradition that is believed to excite "spiritual heroism," embracing the holiness of love, lamentation, battle, and the longing for God. Rumi: Voice of Longing collects nearly 100 of Rumi's most memorable quatrains, presented here for the first time on two superbly remastered CD recordings. Includes a special appearance by renowned poet Robert Bly.

Translated and performed by the Rumi scholar Coleman Barks, these works echo with a spiritual complexity that defies their outward simplicity. As Sufism acknowledges the truth of other religions, so does Rumi's poetry reflect universal themes: the search for the highest truth, the mystery of surrender, the longing to overcome ego imprisonment. Rumi: Voice of Longing captures the silence, the love, and the playfulness that make each experience with this work one of sacred wonder.