February 20, 2015

Students join Robin McCabe for lively faculty recital March 2

In the first half of her March 2 faculty recital in Meany Hall titled “Around Robin,” Robin McCabe will play a well-loved piano suite by French impressionist composer Maurice Ravel. And then in the second half, things are going to get a little nutty.

McCabe, UW professor of piano, said she’ll start with Ravel’s “Miroirs,” which she calls “very evocative, heady music, and a nice foil for the antics of the second half.”

And by antics, she means second-half performances involving “eight hands on two pianos,” as she’ll be joined by her students to play lively arrangements of Bizet’s “Carmen Fantasy,” Emanuel Chabrier’s “Espana,” Mozart’s overture to “Don Giovani” and John Philip Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever.”

“Very festive, fun music,” said McCabe, who the Tokyo Press once called a “pianistic powerhouse”: “I will be playing a part on each piece, with my various students — with a few surprises thrown in.”

The recital is at 7:30 p.m. in Meany Hall, and tickets are $12-$20.