Known for her silvery tone, inspiring master classes, and broad solo and chamber music repertoire, Nicole Narboni is a pianist, teacher, blogger and advocate for broadening access and understanding to classical music in traditionally underserved communities.
As part of her musical mission, Dr. Narboni is reaching out to new audiences in rural areas of Nebraska. She is a 2008-2009 recipient of a Layman Fund grant ($10,000) which has allowed her to create the "Piano-in-Tow" tour. With additional assistance from Yamaha Concert Artists Division, Narboni has taken her Yamaha C-7 grand piano to central and Eastern Nebraska communities for a series of live classical concerts. During the day, Dr. Narboni perfomed for middle and high school students and in the evening, she gave informal talks and performed for adults members of these communities. Narboni continued this odyssey in April by visiting towns in the North central and Northwest region of the state. The "Piano-in-Tow" tour will extend into the spring of 2010, thanks in part to a continuation of the Layman Fund grant.
As part of the inaugural tour, Nebraska Educational Television sent a crew to film the school visits. This video will be featured on NET in the fall of 2009.
In addition to Dr. Narboni’s musical pursuits, she is Senior Lecturer in Piano at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln School of Music, where she has won awards for her innovative and inspired teaching. As testimony to Dr. Narboni's commitment to teaching excellence, she has just been awarded the UNL Parents' Outstanding Teaching Award for 2007-2008. This is the third time that she has been so honored. It is a testimony to her ability to interest, engage, and enliven the musical experience for students.
Dr. Narboni has a B.M. degree from the University of Texas, a M.M. from the Shepherd School of Music, Rice University and a DMA from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University. She has studied with renowned piano masters Reah Sadowsky, John Perry and Yoheved Kaplinsky.
Nicole Narboni is an accomplished performer and recitalist both in the U.S. and abroad. As as champion of 20th-century French keyboard music, she frequently performs and presents lectures here and in France on such composers as Jean Francaix, Germaine Tailleferre, Olivier Messaien, Claude Debussy, and Maurice Ravel. She has often performed as a guest artist at the prestigious Cercle France-Amèrique in Paris.
Narboni’s acclaimed concert performances have been broadcast on WQXR in New York, WETA/WGMS in Washington DC, and on more than 200 NPR stations nationwide via American Public Media’s Performance Today. She frequently serves as an adjudicator, speaker, and presenter at conferences, competitions, and festivals. Nicole Narboni has conducted masterclasses at the Ameropa Chamber Music Festival in Prague, Czeck Republic, at the MusicFest Northwest in Spokane, Washington and at the Chamber Music Institute at the University of Nebraska--Lincoln.
As a recording artist, Nicole Narboni has issued CD’s of works by Germaine Tailleferre, Francis Poulenc, Béla Bartók, Paul Bowles, Randall Snyder, and Bohuslav Martinu. Her newest release, a multimedia CD/video project supported in part by a grant from the Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts, is devoted to the solo piano works of Jean Françaix. Selections from the CD, "The Solo Piano Works of Jean Francaix" have been featured on radio stations throughout the country and Dr. Narboni appeared as a featured guest on WFMT's (Chicago) "Impromptu" hosted by Steve Robinson in March of 2009.
For many years, Dr. Narboni collaborated with musical partner Mark Clinton as the Clinton-Narboni Duo. They won a number of significant prizes, including the 1994 ProPiano New York Recital Competition, the 1995 National Federation of Music Clubs Ellis Duo Piano Competition, the Alvin Perlman prize at the Fifth Murray Dranoff International Two Piano Competition, and the 1996 Concorso Internazionale Carlo Soliva (four-hand division). The Clinton/Narboni Duo made their New York debut at Carnegie Recital Hall in February 1995, their Chicago debut on the prestigious Dame Myra Hess Series in July 1996, and their European debut in Paris in June 1997. They gave the world premiere performance of Ned Rorem's Six Variations for Two Pianos in Miami in December 1995. Clinton and Narboni's debut compact disc of Works for Two Pianos and Piano Four-Hands by Germaine Tailleferre (ELAN CD 82278) received high praise from Gramophone magazine which selected it as an "Editor's Choice" selection in the November 1997 issue and declared it "...absolutely first rate, with an immensely engaging spirit, delicacy, variety of touch and subtle shadings...an irresistibly joyous disc."
Nicole Narboni, a Steinway Artist, has been a faculty member at the School of Music at UNL since 1995. She can be reached at nnarboni1@unl.edu. You can also find her unique perspectives on music, the arts, and life in Lincoln, Nebraska on her blogsite: http://drnan.wordpress.com
