Dave Hunter holds a PhD in Music Composition and Ethnomusicology from the University of Chicago. Dave also studied Composition, Ethnomusicology and Improvisation at the University of Washington in Seattle. Dave holds a B.M. in Music Composition from Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois and an A.A. from Harper College in Palatine, Illinois.

“My first experience with music came when I lived in Morton, Illinois in the late 1960s. My neighbor Scott Rendleman was a very young talented drummer and he taught me how to play “Wipe Out” on the snare drum. He had a little neighborhood group and they played parts of Iron Butterfly’s “In-a-Gadda-Davida” and The Association’s “Windy”. I tried to imitate them on my toy drum set and toy guitar. He also took me to a neighbor’s house where we heard Side B of Jimi Hendrix’ “Electric Ladyland.” But the first record I ever heard was “Peanuts” (with Kaye Ballard and Arthur Siegel). The soundtrack was made using toy instruments of the day, written by film composer, Fred Karlin. Extremely unique. The other record I heard was Herb Alpert’s “Whipped Cream”. I loved both of them. I played them to death. I still have both albums. Another experience I had was from my first-grade music teacher, who played Henry Cowell’s piece, “The Banshee” on Halloween. It was freaky and scary, and I liked it! I also remember watching Beatles cartoons, and of course, The Monkees. Then we moved to Mt. Prospect, Illinois in 1970.”

In Mt. Prospect, Dave started playing music at the age of ten, taking guitar and drum lessons from Darlene Heine and John Schoenberger respectively. Another important development came when he received his first tape recorder at age 11.“ I used to do little radio shows, try out imitations and make wacky songs with my buddy, Todd Campbell.”

Dave played in the school band with a forward-thinking director, David Metzler. “I played mostly bass drum because I wanted to make the most noise.” Along with that, he also played in a little band called “Fuzz” with another boyhood buddy, Stuart Oswald. In high school, Dave played guitar in the school jazz band, and formed bands with Stuart and Todd.

Dave went on to college as music major at Harper College. He studied music theory with Stanley Ryberg, George Makas and Barbara Bowker. He sang in the choir and played in the jazz band. He also studied classical guitar with Steve Suvada.

“Barbara Bowker exposed me to the music of avant-garde composers like John Cage, Harry Partch, Henry Cowell and others. This is also when I first heard the music of Igor Stravinsky, which had a huge emotional impact on me. Barbara also had us work with a Moog synthesizer in our 20th century theory class. She initially opened my mind to the avant-garde.”

It was also during this time (ca.1981) Dave got his first 4-track tape recorder, a TEAC-2340. He had already been experimenting with his dad’s variable-speed tape recorder and started to apply tape techniques to his songs.

Dave received his A.A. degree in 1982 and moved on to Northern Illinois University. It was at NIU where he was exposed to music from different cultures. Dave studied Balinese Gamelan with Huo-Kuang Han, African music with Robert Chappell and Alan O’Connor, and North Indian Tabla with Chappell. He also studied composition formally with Robert Fleisher, Jan Bach and Tim Blickhan. Dave also played in several jazz combos. But what really opened up his musical language was the study of electronic music with Joe Pinzarrone.

“Joe had an amazing pedagogy in teaching electronic music. He had us composing right away, giving us just a few techniques and parameters to work with. Back then (1985-87), we were working with tape and analog synthesizers. We also got to do collaborative projects with visual art students. It was so much fun I wanted to stay at NIU forever.”