Dr. Casey Robards

Korean American adoptee, Casey Robards is a music director, pianist and vocal coach known for her sensitive musicality, expert collaborative skill, stylistic versatility and operatic conducting. She has given recitals throughout the United States, Europe, Central and South America and Asia. 2021-23 performances include concerts with Ollie Watts Davis, LaToya Lain, Kenneth Overton, Karen Slack, Brian Downen, Cherry Duke; and performances with the American Spiritual Ensemble and National Chorale.  Robards was pianist on the recent CD releases: “Botanica: music for oboe and English horn” with Sara Fraker (MSR Classics), “Chinese Fantasies” with violinist Fangye Sun (Blue Griffin) and “Figments Vol 3” with John Dee, oboe and Bernhard Scully, horn (Navona Records). Upcoming recordings include separate CD projects with Bernhard Scully and flutist, Martha Councell-Vargas.

In 2023, Robards was appointed music director of Ensemble Concept 21, a Midwest chamber group that promotes new works by emerging and established composers. Recent music directing projects include Derek McPhatter/Mike Pryzgoda’s Afro-surrealist Water Riot in Beta: A Cyberpunk Rock Opera (Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago), Three Decembers, The Gift (South Bend Lyric Opera), Die Zauberflöte,  La Boheme, La Traviata, Schicchi/Suor (Bay View Music Festival), and at the University of Illinois, Lucia di Lammermoor and student premieres by Jiwon Hahn/Jolie O’Dell and Caleb Liddell. In 2017, she served as associate music director of the world premiere of “BOUNCE: The Basketball opera” co-produced with Ardea Arts and Univ. of Kentucky. 

Dr. Robards made her Carnegie Hall debut in November 2017 with baritone Christiaan Smith in a program singing popular Top 40 songs as art song. Dr. Robards currently tours with singer LaToya Lain in a “Narrative of a Slave Woman,” a dramatic and moving lecture-recital formatted program of Negro spirituals and Ollie Watts Davis in an art song recital “Toward Justice and Shared Humanity: Art Song of Black Composer as Lens, Language, Vision and Hope.” She created a “Shakespeare Cabaret,” an interdisciplinary project involving music by Glen Roven. Robards has played keyboard in the Broadway touring productions of Wicked, Beautiful: The Carole King Story, and West Side Story. 

A committed pedagogue, Robards has special interest in piano and vocal music by Black composers, having experience in Black sacred music genres. She is the foremost expert on the life and music of John D. Carter (1932-1981). Dr. Robards wrote a chapter on collaborative piano for “So You Want to Sing Spirituals” published by Rowman & Littlefield.  Interested in the intersection of music and social justice, Robards has created benefit recitals for MUSICAMBIA, a non-profit organization that creates music conservatories in prisons. 

Currently Asst. Prof. of Vocal Coaching and Accompanying at the University of Illinois, previous appointments include vocal coaching and collaborative piano at Indiana University, Oberlin Conservatory (postdoc) and Central Michigan University.  As Head of Collaborative Piano at the Bay View Festival, Robards co-founded a two week program for young collegiate singers and pianists, serves as the pianist/coach for the American Spiritual Intensive and is entering in her fifth year as MainStage Opera Conductor, her 16th season on faculty.

Robards received the Henri Kohn Memorial Award for outstanding achievement at Tanglewood Music Festival. As a pianist/coach, Robards was a NATS Professional Intern, a Songfest Professional Development Program Participant and as a conductor, a participant in the Banff Opera in the 21st Century program. Professional memberships include IKCAS (International Keyboard Collaborative Arts Society), NATS, Maestra, MUSE, Deus Ex Musica, and the National Opera Association (Chair of the Sacred in Opera Initiative).