https://www.stmarcus.org/church/special-interest/fine-arts-series
David M. Cherwien is currently serving as Cantor at Mt. Olive Lutheran Church, Minneapolis, MN, and in 2002 was appointed Artistic Director for the National Lutheran Choir, also based in the Twin Cities. He has also held full time parish music positions in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, Chicago, Seattle, and Berlin. During the 2000-2001 academic year he served as Organist/Cantor of Christ Chapel and Visiting Instructor of Music at Gustavus College, St. Peter, MN. While in Chicago, he served as Teaching Associate in Service Playing and improvisation at Elmhurst College. He completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in organ performance, and the Master of Arts degree in Theory and Composition, both from the University of Minnesota. His undergraduate work was in organ performance and choral music education at Augsburg College, Minneapolis, where he was honored as distinguished alumni in the fall of 2000.
Following his undergraduate work, he studied for two years at the Berlin Church Music School in Berlin, Germany. There he studied improvisation with Renate Zimmermann, organ Literature with Karl Hochreither, conducting with Martin Behrmann, and composition with the late Ernst Pepping. He has also studied organ with Christian Baude in Aix-en-Provence, France, and with Paul Manz, Heinrich Fleisher, and Earl Barr in this country, and is a Fellow with Melodious Accord, studying composition with Alice Parker.
David Cherwien is a prolific composer with over 150 publications of choral and organ music, with several publishers including MorningStar Music, and is the 2007 winner of the Raabe Prize for Excellence in Sacred Composition for his piece, "The Souls of the Righteous." For the National Lutheran Choir alone, Cherwien has composed at least 24 new works during his tenure with the Choir. He has released numerous recordings of Hymns and Choral Music through Mount Olive Lutheran Church, and the National Lutheran Choir, and serves editor for the National Lutheran Choir Series with MorningStar. Recordings and music may be found at: nlca.com, mountolivechurch.org, and morningstarmusic.com.
David is a founding member of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians, serving in its leadership in a variety of capacities, including National President from 1993 to 1997. He is also active in the American Guild of Organists and Choristers Guild.
His workshops on church music, service playing and improvisation, and his hymn festivals and other worship leadership roles have continuously brought him to many parts of the country, including in 2016 serving as Lecturer and Hymn Festival leader at the Presbyterian University and Seminary in Seoul, Korea.
2009-2025 AGO - Milwaukee Chapter