Multi-instrumentalist from Asbury Park, New Jersey, who studied classical music and was playing piano at the age of seven and guitar at age eleven. By the time he was a teenager he was already playing with local bands such as The Bruce Springsteen Band, Dr. Zoom and the Sonic Boom, Glory Road, and The Sundance Band.
He relocated to Richmond, Virginia, in 1972, and became a fixture in Alpha Studios, getting steady work as a session musician on jingles and other recordings. When Bruce Springsteen was assembling a band for his first LP, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., he tapped David to play the keyboards. He did not join the band for the accompanying tour, instead returning to Alpha studios to lay down some demonstration reels with Ernest “Boom” Carter and Garry Tallent.
The origin of the E Street Band’s name is attributed to the street on which David’s mother resided. In those early, lean days, she permitted the up-and-coming musicians to literally rock the house.
In 1973, David went on the road with the newly named band, adding a bit of classical and jazz to the mix. These were the genres of music he was most interested in, and in 1974, he quit the band and started his own jazz-fusion-progressive-rock outfit, Tone. The core of the group comprised David, Gerald Carboy, and Ernest “Boom” Carter, and at times they were joined by other musicians such as Alex Ligertwood, Gayle Moran, and Patti Scialfa.
In 1975, David inked a deal with Epic Records and issued his debut solo album, Forest of Feelings. His follow-up, Transformation: Speed of Love, and Tone’s self-titled debut album hit the shelves in 1976. Tone recorded another LP entitled Dance of the Age of Enlightenment, but Arista, the label David switched to, and Epic, couldn’t come to any kind of legal agreement about who owned the rights to the songs. Subsequently, it sat on a shelf until its long-awaited release in 2004. Tone released True Stories in 1978, but it would be their last album together.
David carried on with his solo career and released two more albums, Just as I Thought and The Bridge, in 1979 and 1982, respectively. He hooked up with Jon Anderson on Animation and played keyboards on the subsequent tour. In the 1980s, he was busy both in the studio, as a session musician, and on the road, filling in when needed on various tours.
Some of the artists he has worked with include Patti Austin, Eric Clapton, Clarence Clemons, Robbie Dupree, Bryan Ferry, Julia Fordham, Aretha Franklin, Peter Gabriel, Daryl Hall, Natalie Merchant, Youssou N’Dour, John Oates, Seal, and Sting. He also reunited with Bruce Springsteen on his 1992 release, Human Touch.
At the turn of the millennium, he resurrected his solo career, unleashing Nine Piano Improvisations on his own recording label, Not by Sight. The album was marketed and sold via the worldwide web. He followed this up with 2005’s Cinema. He played several live dates with The Gulley Flats Boys, a band fronted by Francis Dunnery, in 2006. Then he spent a couple of years performing around the globe with Zucchero Fornaciari on his “All the Best” and “Fly” tours.
In 2009, he went on an international tour with Jeff Beck, Vinnie Colaiuta, and Tal Wilkenfeld that included dates in Australia, Japan, and New Zealand.
In 2014 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of The E Street Band.
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