Jonathan Pasternack conducts the University Symphony in a program of works by Gubaidulina, Rachmaninoff, and Shostakovich. Program selections include Sofia Gubaidulina: the rider on the white horse (2004) (American Premiere); Sergei Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, featuring Robin McCabe, piano; and Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5.

ARTIST BIOS

Robin McCabe, piano

Celebrated American pianist Robin McCabe 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, and in seven concert tours of the Far East. The United States Department of State sponsored her two South American tours, which were triumphs both artistically and diplomatically.

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,” later expanded into a book of the same title.

McCabe performs regularly throughout the United States, and in September of 2011 she made her first visit to South Korea.  She appears often as an invited jurist for international piano competitions, most recently in New Orleans, San Antonio, and Vancouver, Canada.

Jonathan Pasternack, conductor

Dr. Jonathan Pasternack is Director of Orchestral Activities at the University of Washington School of Music during the 2010-11 academic year. He has conducted orchestras, opera and ballet in the United States and Europe, with such ensembles as the London Symphony Orchestra, Residentie Orkest of the Hague, Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center, among many others. His debut recording, leading the London Symphony Orchestra in Béla Bartók's Miraculous Mandarin suite and the Symphony No. 1 by Johannes Brahms, was released in January 2011 on the Naxos label.

Dr. Pasternack has served as Assistant Conductor with the Oregon Symphony, Resident Conductor and Managing Director of the Icicle Creek Music Center in Leavenworth, and Visiting Director of Orchestral Activities at Pacific Lutheran University. He has served as guest faculty at the University of Washington, Central Washington University, East Oregon University, Pacific University, Conservatoire de Maurepas in France and Conservatoire Supérieur de Musique de Genève in Switzerland.