David Coffin
David Coffin is a folk musician specializing in early music and sea music, based in Gloucester, Massachusetts. He is the song leader for the Cambridge Revels music programs and is the director of the Narration Program for Boston Harbor Cruises. He also presents music enrichment programs for schools throughout New England. One program is based on the history of the recorder and the other is called Life at Sea: A Voyage in Song.
Coffin is possessed of a bass-baritone voice and plays various types of recorders and whistles, in addition to archaic instruments like the shawm, racket or gemshorn. Coffin comes from a musical background: His father, Rev. William Sloane Coffin, studied to be a concert pianist with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, his grandfather was pianist Arthur Rubinstein, and his great-grandfather was Polish conductor Emil Mlynarski.
He has also completed the digital archive of over 330 sermons from the Riverside Church in New York City to a dedicated website: www.williamsloanecoffin.org
He works at Save the Harbor/ Save the Bay since 2000. He leads the All Access Boston Harbor youth program, which brings kids from all over Massachusetts to go to George's Island or Spectacle Island.
Discography
In addition to contributing to a variety of collaborative CDs for Revels Records and North Star Records, local New England recording labels, Coffin has also recorded four solo albums: Flight of Time, Nantucket Sleighride, Safe in the Harbour, and Last Trip Home which he recorded with his daughter Linnea, all of which feature traditional and maritime music, some of which is taken from the singing of Ewan MacColl and Stan Rogers.
External links
- The official website of David Coffin
- The official website of Revels, Inc.
- www.bostonharborcruises.com
- www.williamsloanecoffin.org