David Aguila is a performer and composer currently based in San Diego, California where he is pursuing a Doctorate in Music in Trumpet Performance from the University of California San Diego. Aguila’s multifaceted practice focuses on trumpet, electronics and music production; working in the fields of contemporary, experimental, electro-acoustic and improvised music. His current research is focused on parametric and gestural notations, sound projection practices and alternative methods to trumpet pedagogy. Aguila’s primary trumpet teachers have been Ruth Still, James Thompson, Ed Carroll, and Stephanie Richards and has studied composition with Vinny Golia and Sara Roberts.

Aguila received his Bachelor’s degree (2009-13) in trumpet performance at the Eastman School of Music. He studied under James Thompson, and performed with the Eastman Wind Ensemble, Philharmonia Orchestra, and Musica Nova ensembles. Aguila performed at the Rochester Percussion Festival, premiering Michael Burrit’s concerto for percussion and wind orchestra, and was Principal Trumpet in the Prismatic Debussy Festival. Additionally, through his involvement with new music ensembles at Eastman, David developed an interest in music composition and went on to continue his education at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in the MFA Performer-Composer program. Notably in 2011 David was on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, during the segment Aguila solved the Rubik's Cube with one hand while playing Haydn's Trumpet Concerto. Aguila was invited to play a solo with the Tonight Show Band and play in the band. 

While getting his MFA at CalArts (2013-15), Aguila studied trumpet with Ed Carroll and studied music composition with Vinny Golia and Sara Roberts with a focus on spatial and electroacoustic music and interdisciplinary performance installation. Pomegranate Jam: A Shadow Ballet, co-composed with Kris Rahamad, was selected for the CalArts New Works Festival in 2015, and would later go on to the Edinburgh Fringe festival receiving four and five star reviews. Aguila has performed with the Vinny Golia Large Ensemble, Sonic Boom Ensemble, and the New Millennium Orchestra at REDCAT, performing the music of Yotam Haber, Gloria Coates, Jani Christou. He also performed Karlheinz Stockhausen’s TrumpeTent and Europa Gruss during the 2015 Stockhausen Festival. 

Upon graduating he would become co-founder and co-artistic director of aLma.MaddR, an interdisciplinary collective dedicated to the creation and presentation of interactive and immersive new works that hope to provide meaningful and transformative experiences for audience members. Notable projects include A live scoring of Carl Theodore Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc with the ensemble Faculty Lounge. aLma.MaddR would also work with the Carillon Trumpet Quartet performing a live version of Mauricio Kagel’s Nah und Fern, Aguila working in sound design and live electronics for the performance. 

Aguila has been a participant at The Center for Advanced Music Studies at Chosen Vale in 2014 and 2018 performing in masterclasses for Marco Blaauw and worked with Clément Saunier, Jeroen Berwaerts, Tom Hooten, and Steph Richards. In the Fall of 2015, Aguila performed in the Industry’s production of Hopscotch, a mobile opera performed in 24 limousines and landmarks around Los Angeles. In 2018 he performed a joint concert with Alexandria Smith for the Vaughn Recital Series at Dartmouth College, and would perform again with Smith during her residency at The Stone at the New School in 2019. Aguila has been a participant in the Stockhausen Courses and Concerts as a Sound Projectionist (2017) studying with Kathinka Pasveer and Trumpet (2019) with Marco Blaauw. Ensemble MusikFabrik Brass Academy (2019) with Christine Chapman, Bruce Collings, and Melvyn Poore, and the Darmstadt Ferienkurse (2021) in the brass course with members of Ensemble MusikFabrik and a collaborative course; composition as listening, with Isabel Mundry and George Lewis performing new works for brass.

In the realm of audio production, Aguila has worked with the band Snow Nerds performing electronics on their EP It’s Really Rampart (2018) and mastered the most recent album Midnight Masquerade (2020). Working extensively with saxophonist and composer Ted Taforo, Aguila has engineered, mixed and mastered; You Are (2018), singles from Outside (2021), Belief in Reality (2021). In their duo, Laptop+Trumpet, Aguila on live electronics and trumpeter Ethan Marks released Blended Metal (2018) on Cosmic Primitive Records. In 2020 Aguila did a remix for King Britt’s A Re-Discovery album, on the label The Buddy System. Currently Aguila is a masterclass teacher for Point Blank Music School in Los Angeles and online teaching Audio Mastering and Intro to Production courses.