Chumbley Family Piano Scholarship

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Established by Robert E. Chumbley in 2021.

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Hailed by critics from the Chicago Tribune, New York Times to Paris Match, Robert Chumbley is one of the most versatile musicians of our day. Equally at home conducting and composing for the musical theater, opera, ballet and symphony, Mr. Chumbley served as Music Director for Atlanta Ballet for five seasons, and for Cleveland Opera. He has appeared as guest conductor with the Breckenridge Music Festival (Colorado), American Repertory Ballet, Norwegian National Opera, the Royal Ballet Orchestra (London), the Carolina Chamber Symphony, Winston-Salem Symphony, and the Prague Chamber Orchestra among other groups. He has served as Principal Guest Conductor of the renowned Piedmont Wind Symphony, and as Artistic Advisor and conductor to the Chicago Chamber Musicians.

His compositions have been commissioned throughout Europe and the United States and been performed by such organizations as Atlanta Ballet, the North Carolina Symphony, Omaha Symphony, the Chicago Chamber Musicians, the Buffalo Philharmonic, Warsaw Philharmonic, Piedmont Wind Symphony, Broyhill Chamber Ensemble, Voices of Change (Dallas), Boston Conservatory Chamber Players, the Da Vinci Trio, WGBH Radio (Boston, on a commission from Very Special Arts Massachusetts) and major international music festivals including An Appalachian Summer, Nestle/Musical Encounters Festival (Lisbon, Portugal), MANCA New Music Festival (Nice, France), North American New Music Festival and ArtsIgnite! He has written incidental theatrical music and three large ballet scores. His works are recorded on MMC Records and published by Carl Fisher, Inc.

As a pianist, Mr. Chumbley’s concert appearances have taken him throughout Europe, Japan, the United States and Africa. He has performed at Carnegie Hall at the invitation of Carnegie Hall, Kaufmann Hall at the 92nd St. Y, and, after accepting an invitation from the U.S. Congress and the Ford Foundation, at the second inauguration of President Bill Clinton. He has appeared as soloist with the North Carolina Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic, South Florida Symphony, Lincoln Symphony, Orchestra Provence Cote d’Azur (Cannes) among others. He has performed the world and North American premieres of works by Pulitzer Prize winning composer Michael Colgrass (Tales of Power for solo piano at the 92nd St. Y in New York and Memento for two pianos and orchestra with the Minnesota Orchestra, Leonard Slatkin conducting) and Alfred Schnittke (Concerto with the Buffalo Philharmonic, Gerhardt Zimmermann conducting).

Mr. Chumbley has served on the faculties of Appalachian State University, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the State University of New York at Buffalo. He is a graduate of the North Carolina School of the Arts and the Juilliard School.

Mr. Chumbley first learned about North Carolina School of the Arts when at age 11, he performed a Mozart concerto with the Jacksonville, Florida Symphony Orchestra. Following his performance, Vittorio Giannini, the original Chancellor of NCSA, came backstage to talk with Mr. Chumbley’s father about Robert becoming a student at NCSA. The minimum grade for enrollment at that time was eighth grade. Chancellor Giannini maintained his connection with the Chumbley Family recruiting Robert as a student until the minimum grade was reached and Robert enrolled at North Carolina School of the Arts at the age of 13.

Mr. Chumbley recently collaborated with Milliken University – College of Fine Arts, composing a new opera, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter.