David Sartor teaches Applied Composition at Belmont University’s School of Music. Sartor’s compositions have garnered more than four dozen prestigious honors and awards, and have been performed by the Cincinnati, Knoxville, Chattanooga, Brevard, Kiev and Czech Symphony Orchestras, the Burlington, Nexus and Mission Chamber Orchestras, the Cathedral Choral Society at the Washington (D.C.) National Cathedral, the Blair Woodwind Quintet, the Minneapolis Vocal Consort, the Chestnut Brass, bassist John Deak, soprano Cheryl Studer, trumpeter Peter Bond, the Indiana Wind Symphony, the "President's Own" United States Marine Corps Concert Band, and numerous regional ensembles and artists. Works by Sartor have also been featured at the Tanglewood, Aspen and Sewanee Music Festivals, the International Double Bass Festival, the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, the International Music Festival in San Jose Costa Rica, the American Guild of Organists' World's Largest Organ Concert, and in chamber music concerts at Carnegie Hall, with broadcast performances and interviews on National Public Radio and local affiliates.
Sartor is an in-demand guest conductor, composer and lecturer whose engagements include the Washington National Cathedral, the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra, the Chattanooga Symphony Orchestra, the Nashville Concerto Orchestra, the Nexus Chamber Orchestra, the Vanderbilt University Orchestra, Illinois State University, Middle Tennessee State University, Trevecca Nazarene University, the Knoxville Brass Choir, the University of Tennessee Brass Choir, the Dogwood Arts Festival Chamber Orchestra, and a “mini-residency” at California State University, sponsored by New York City’s Meet The Composer Foundation. He is the founder and Music Director of Nashville’s award-winning Parthenon Chamber Orchestra, and is a fourteen-time honoree in The American Prizes, national awards celebrating American excellence in the arts. With his 2021 Third Place win in their Competition for Orchestral Conducting, Sartor became the only person to date to win American Prizes in three major categories: Conducting, Composition and Orchestral Performance. The committee of judges also designated him as an "Honored Artist of the American Prize,” in recognition of sustained excellence in the competitions.
Sartor received a Bachelor of Music from the University of Tennessee, where he studied composition with John Anthony Lennon and David Van Vactor and conducting with Donald Neuen, and a Master of Music from Middle Tennessee State University, studying composition with Paul Osterfield and conducting with Carol Nies. His additional study includes private conducting instruction with Karen Lynne Deal, conducting workshops with Kenneth Schermerhorn, John Morris Russell and Diane Wittry, and film scoring workshops with Steven Scott Smalley, Richard Glasser and Aaron Zigman, His works are recorded on the Naxos label, are published by E.C. Schirmer, Shawnee Press, and Metamorphic Music, and are distributed worldwide by J. W. Pepper Music.
Sartor resides in Wilson County, Tennessee with his wife, the author Nancy Sartor.
Contact: david.sartor@belmont.edu