Tabea Debus

In the first years of the 2020s, recorder virtuoso Tabea Debus gained recognition for her work in both fresh contemporary pieces and the central Baroque literature, while also serving as an instructor and originator of community programs built around her instrument. Born in Würzburg, Germany, on February 10, 1991, she first trained at the Frankfurt University of Music and the Performing Arts under Michael Schneider before continuing at the Royal Academy of Music in London with Pamela Thorby. During this period she held two major German awards, the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) and the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes. In the early 2010s she earned top honors at the 2011 Hülsta Woodwinds International and the 2014 Johann Heinrich Schmelzer competitions, and she joined artist-development schemes that had seldom included recorder players, among them the St. John’s Smith Square Young Artist program (2015-2016) and the City Music Foundation Artist scheme (2016-2018). By then she was already performing widely throughout Europe and the United States, extending her schedule to Colombia and Malaysia, and she had given recitals at Wigmore Hall as well as at numerous festivals in Britain and Germany. Debus has worked with prominent early-music groups such as the Dunedin Consort, The English Concert, and the English Chamber Orchestra at Cadogan Hall; she established the period-instrument ensemble tr!jo and has appeared as soloist with the WDR Rundfunkchor in Cologne in programs of newly composed recorder concertos. Her recordings have appeared on the TYX Art, Delphian, and Signum Classics labels, including a 2021 release with La Serenissima titled Settecento on the last of these imprints. In addition to her concert career she maintains an active teaching role at Wells Cathedral School, has conducted workshops at the Royal Academy of Music and Cambridge University, and has presented sessions in schools and at the Royal London Hospital.