David Brian Huron (né Harrison). Born June 1, 1954 in Peace River, Alberta, Canada. Died in Benicia, California on June 5th, from cancer. Son of Allan Henry Harrison (1919-2011) and Luella Gertrude Scott (1925-2011). Survived by long-time partner and spouse Kristin Precoda, brothers Douglas Allan, Kenneth Bruce, sister Marion Gaye, in-laws Beth Harrison-Cain, Peter Thompson, and nephew Casey Scott Harrison. 

David was a music lover, musician, and music scholar. Throughout his childhood and adolescence David received extensive training in piano, organ, flute, and music theory. He attended Canterbury High School for the performing arts in Ottawa and subsequently studied flute with Karin Schindler at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. In 1978 he completed an interdisciplinary undergraduate degree at the University of Waterloo--pursuing mixed studies in music, aesthetics, psychology, acoustics, computer science, and engineering.

For several years after graduation David was active as a composer. His music was programmed in some fifty concerts and was featured in single-composer productions in Ottawa, New York, and Rio de Janeiro. Discouraged by mix-ups in which he was mistaken for another composer by the same name, David Harrison legally changed his name to David Huron in 1984.

David continued his education, completing a masters degree at York University, Toronto (where he worked with semiotician David Lidov), and a doctoral degree in musicology at the University of Nottingham, UK (where he was supervised by Brahms scholar, Robert Pascall). At Nottingham, David also began conducting experimental studies, collaborating with psychoacoustician Deborah Fantini at the nearby British Institute for Hearing Research. Abandoning his activities as a composer, David spent the rest of his career conducting music research, producing nearly 200 scholarly publications including three influential books: The Science of Sadness: A New Understanding of Emotion (2024), Sweet Anticipation: The Psychology of Expectation (2006) and Voice Leading: The Science Behind a Musical Art (2016).

Upon completing a PhD in 1989, David was appointed Assistant Professor of Music at Conrad Grebel College, receiving a promotion to Associate Professor in 1991. He held concurrent positions at the University of Waterloo, including administrative Coordinator and principal instructor at UW's Center for Society, Technology, and Values. At the University of Waterloo, he also held complimentary appointments as Associate Professor of Psychology (1994-1998) and Adjunct Professor of Systems Design Engineering (1994-1998).

In 1998, David emigrated to the United States where he took up the position of Professor in the Ohio State University School of Music with a salaried joint appointment at the Center for Cognitive Science (later the Center for Cognitive and Brain Sciences). At OSU he was head of the Cognitive and Systematic Musicology Laboratory for 22 years, retiring in 2019 with the rank of Arts and Humanities Distinguished Professor. During his OSU tenure he supervised two dozen doctoral and post-doctoral researchers in systematic and empirical music research. He also taught empirical research methods in musicology to nearly two hundred scholars and students from other institutions through annual week-long summer workshops.

David's scholarship was recognized through several awards, including the Society for Music Perception and Cognition's lifetime Achievement Award (2017), the Society for Music Theory's Lifetime Membership Award (2019), and a Fulbright Research Chair (2020) which he was unable to take up due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2021 he was named Nico Frijda Honorary Chair in Cognitive Science, awarded by the Amsterdam Brain and Cognition Center and the Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies, University of Amsterdam