Dr. David A. Wells has extremely wide-ranging musical tastes, abilities, and experiences. Currently, he is mostly engaged in historically-informed performances on period bassoons ranging from the 17th to the early 20th centuries with groups such as the Carmel Bach Festival, American Bach Soloists, Sinfonia Spirituosa, Sacramento Baroque Soloists, Philharmonie Austin, and the Aston Magna Music Festival. He is also an adept performer on the modern bassoon and contrabassoon, equally at home with standard orchestral/chamber/solo repertoire and demanding modern works involving extended techniques and/or electronics. In addition, Wells has a predilection for taking the bassoon to unexpected places, most notably having played for nine years with the Django Reinhardt-inspired swing sextet Hot Club Faux Gitane.
Wells serves as Co-Executive Director of Meg Quigley, an organization focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion within the bassoon world.
He is also an active music scholar, having presented at the conferences of the American Musicological Society, the Society for American Music, and the International Double Reed Society. At Sacramento State, Wells teaches bassoon, music history, and general education music classes. He holds both a D.M.A. in Bassoon Performance and an M.A. in Musicology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and his principal teachers include Jeffrey Lyman, Jeff Keesecker, and Marc Vallon. When not playing or teaching, he can be found open-water swimming, photographing nature, collecting records, and trying to keep up with his super-librarian/yogi wife, Veronica.
Dr. David A. Wells teaches bassoon and music history at California State University, Sacramento, where he also formerly served as Co-Director of the annual Festival of New American Music (FeNAM). As a performer, he plays both modern and period instruments in a wide variety of ensembles and styles. On modern bassoon, he freelances with orchestras throughout Northern California, collaborates with colleagues in chamber groups, and plays with the swing sextet Hot Club Faux Gitane. On Baroque bassoon, he has recently performed with the American Bach Soloists, Pacific Baroque Orchestra (Vancouver, BC), Sacramento Baroque Soloists, Capella Antiqua, at the Carmel Bach Festival, and is a founding member of Sinfonia Spirituosa.
Wells serves as Co-Executive Director of Meg Quigley, an organization focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion within the bassoon world. He is also active as a music scholar, having presented papers at the conferences of the American Musicological Society, the Society for American Music, and the International Double Reed Society, on topics including the history of the bassoon in jazz, rediscovering the bassoonist who first played the Rite of Spring solo, the effects of World War I on American orchestras, and cross-gender casting in the operas of Lully and Rameau.
Wells holds both a D.M.A. in Bassoon Performance and an M.A. in Musicology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and previously studied at Florida State University and Arizona State University. His principal teachers include Jeffrey Lyman, Jeff Keesecker, and Marc Vallon. When not playing or teaching, he can be found swimming, taking photographs, collecting records, and trying to keep up with his super-librarian/uber-yogi wife, Veronica.
Contact Dr. Wells at david.wells@csus.edu.
Projects/Ensembles/Organizations
Links to other things that I am or have been heavily involved in:
