Davide Cavalli began his piano studies with Alfredo Speranza, graduating with honours from the Luisa D’Annunzio Conservatory in Pescara. Subsequently, he attended specialisation courses with Edith Fischer, Robert Szidon, Aquiles Delle Vigne and Pier Narciso Masi and he obtained a Master of Arts in Musical Disciplines, specialising in Piano, with Roberto Cappello, and a Master of Arts in Chamber Music with Pierpaolo Maurizzi, both from the Arrigo Boito Conservatory of Parma and with full marks and honours.
He has performed, both as soloist and in chamber music ensembles, at prestigious musical institutions, including the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, the Odessa Philharmonic Society, the Tel Aviv Opera House, la St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral di New York, the Etihad Museum of Dubai, the Hindemith Foundation of Blonay, the Valle d’Itria Festival, the Ravenna Festival, the Teatro Regio of Parma, the Joaquín Turina hall in Seville, the Schubert Club of Saint Paul and the University of Minnesota.
He also gave concerts at the Église de Saanen and the Auditorium Kirchgemeindehaus in Gstaadt, the Eglise Saint Marc in Brussels, the Salle des Arts in Paris, the Teatro Municipale in Piacenza, the Paganini Auditorium in Parma, the Conservatory of Italian Switzerland in Lugano, the Conservatory of Geneva, the Conservatory of Milan, the Royal City Conservatory, the Palacultura of Messina in Prague, Barcelona, Des Moines (Iowa), Milwaukee, Philadelphia. As part of the Internationales Kammermusik Festival Austria, he recorded the Suites for piano duo by Sergej Rachmaninov for the Austrian radio and television (ORF) at the Stift Altenburg Bibliothek, together with Davide Muccioli.
Cavalli was the overall winner of the Seiler Piano Competition in Crete, the Frédéric Chopin Competition in Rome and the Camillo Togni Competition in Brescia. He also obtained the first prize in several national piano competitions.
He has been intensely active in the musical theatre, collaborating with prestigious institutions (the Salzburg Festival, the Ravenna Festival, the Rome Opera House, among others), with conductors such as Riccardo Muti, Patrick Fournillier, Ottavio Dantone, Andrea Battistoni, Boris Brott, Nicola Paszkowski, Stefano Montanari, and with directors including Graham Vick, Pier Luigi Pizzi, Cristina Mazzavillani Muti, Micha van Hoecke, Chiara Muti, Shirin Neshat, Cesare Lievi, Emilio Sagi, Andrea De Rosa.
He works regularly with the Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra and he took part to the following tours: I Due Figaro by Saverio Mercadante at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Il Trovatore at the Royal Opera House in Muscat in Oman, Rigoletto at the Bahrain National Theatre, Falstaff and Macbeth at the Savonlinna Opera Festivals in Finland and in "The Roads of Friendship’s concerts" conducted by Riccardo Muti in Kiev, Tehran Athens, Yerevan, Lourdes and Jerash. In the recent years he has collaborated with the Opera di Roma for the production of Puccini's Manon Lescaut and with the Salzburg Festival for Verdi's Ernani and Aida, all under the baton of Riccardo Muti.
To celebrate the bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi, he took part to the "Echi notturni di incanti Verdiani" project, in collaboration with Rai 1, in Roncole di Busseto, birthplace of the Maestro, writing a musical arrangement for the death scenes of the of the Popular Trilogy’s heroines. On December 19th, 2014, on the tenth anniversary of Renata Tebaldi’s death, he performed Gioachino Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle in the Basilica of San Marino. Since 2015, he is the pianist of the Riccardo Muti Italian Opera Academy. In August 2017, he was korrepetitor and musical assistant for the staging of Giuseppe Verdi's Aida at the Salzburg Festival conducted by Riccardo Muti, with Anna Netrebko, Francesco Meli, Ekaterina Semenchuk and Luca Salsi in the leading roles.
On April 6th, 2019, together with tenor Francesco Meli, he performed in Rome, at Palazzo Madama, as part of the series of concerts "Senato & Cultura", to celebrate Franco Zeffirelli's Career Award, which was conferred by the Senate President. In 2020, he performed Donizetti's cantata Il Conte Ugolino, alongside baritone Luca Micheletti, for the opening of the celebrations of the 700 years since Dante Alighieri's death, in the presence of the President of the Italian Republic.
Since 2022 he has been musical director of the Opera Academy at Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa.
