Robin McCabe, piano

Celebrated American pianist Robin McCabe has enthralled audiences on four continents with her virtuosic performances, and has established herself as one of America’s most communicative and persuasive artists. McCabe’s involvement and musical sensibilities have delighted audiences across the United States, Europe, Canada, South America, and the Far East.

Critics respond both to McCabe’s prowess and to her expressive intensity. As noted by the New York Times, “What Ms. McCabe has that raises her playing to such a special level is a strong lyric instinct and confidence in its ability to reach and touch the listener.” She has won numerous prizes and awards, and her recordings have received universal acclaim. Her debut album featured the Agosti transcription of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite, a premiere recording of that piece. Critics praised it as “mightily impressive.” Stereo Review described her disc of Bartok as “all that we have come to expect from this artist, a first-rate performance!”

McCabe, a Puyallup native, earned her bachelor of music degree summa cum laude at the University of Washington School of Music, where she studied with Béla Siki, and her master’s and doctorate degrees at the Juilliard School of Music, where she studied with Rudolf Firkusny. She joined the Juilliard faculty in 1978, then returned to the UW in 1987 to accept a position on the piano faculty. In 1994 McCabe was appointed Director of the School of Music. She continues to teach as Professor of Piano and head of the school’s keyboard division, and was one of two Ruth Sutton Waters Professors of Music for 2002-05. In addition, McCabe is a persuasive arts ambassador and advocate for arts audience development.

The winner of numerous prizes and awards, including the International Concert Artists Guild Competition and a Rockefeller Foundation grant, McCabe was the subject of a lengthy New Yorker magazine profile, “Pianist’s Progress,” which was later expanded into a book of the same title.

She was honored in 1993 at Seattle’s Association for Women in Communications annual Matrix Table dinner, at which outstanding women of achievement in business, the arts, and community service are recognized. In 1995 McCabe presented the annual faculty lecture — a concert with commentary — at the University of Washington. She was the first professor of music in the history of the University to be awarded this lectureship. The November 1997 Seattle magazine selected McCabe as one of 17 current and past University of Washington professors who have had an impact on life in the Pacific Northwest.

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