Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover

Described by The Times as a charismatic virtuoso, recorder player, collaborator and teacher Tabea Debus is constantly exploring the horizons of music for recorder and has performed widely across Europe, Asia, Colombia and the USA.

Tabea’s keen interest in contemporary music for recorder has led to numerous collaborations with composers. She has premiered new works in London at LSO Soundhub, at the Barbican Centre’s Sound Unbound and Baroque at the Edge festivals, worked with composers including Philip Cashian, Freya Waley-Cohen, Moritz Eggert and Alex Nante, and has appeared as soloist in contemporary recorder concertos with the WDR Rundfunkchor at the Funkhaus in Cologne and the English Chamber Orchestra at Cadogan Hall.

As a soloist and chamber musician Tabea regularly appears with La Serenissima and The English Concert, and joined the recorder quartet Palisander in 2023. She has performed at the Wigmore Hall, at Early Music Festivals in London, San Francisco, York and Brecon, the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the Schleswig-Holstein Musikfestival, Musica Antiqua Bolzano, Edinburgh International Festivals, and many more. She is a regular guest on BBC Radio 3’s In Tune and Early Music Show, and has released seven solo discs to date.  

Passionate about outreach work, she has led masterclasses at the Royal Academy and Royal College of Music, mdw Vienna, Chicago and Cambridge Universities. She has collaborated with Music Masters, Saffron Hall, Jackdaws Music Education Trust, and the RAM’s Open Academy, bringing music to children from all backgrounds. In collaboration with other musicians, artists and actors she is constantly developing new interdisciplinary projects, including the music-art-game ‘soundshapes’, and play-along library ‘Continuo Lines’. Tabea has also been an adjudicator for the British Composer Awards (BASCA) and regularly joins the panel of the German youth music competition Jugend musiziert. 

Awards include the WEMAG Soloists Prize at the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the CAG/Richard S. Weinert Award for Innovation in Classical Music, 1st prize at the Society of Recorder Players/Moeck International Solo Recorder Competition in London, as well as management contracts with Young Classical Artists Trust (YCAT) and the Concert Artists Guild (CAG, New York). 

Born in Würzburg, Germany, Tabea studied at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts with Prof. Michael Schneider and at the Royal Academy of Music in London with Pamela Thorby. Graduating with the Principal’s Prize, she went on to be appointed Meaker Fellow at the RAM for a year, and was elected Associate of the RAM (ARAM) in 2023.

www.tabeadebus.com

_{Photo: Benjamin Ealovega}