Cowan, Robert; and Yarbrough, Joan

Summary: Joan Yarbrough and Robert Cowan were a husband and wife duo piano team with a busy concert career of almost 300 concerts in the U.S., Europe, and Mexico (1964-1965). They have been duo-pianists-in-residence at the University of Montevallo in Montevallo, Alabama, and artist-faculty members at the Brevard Music Center in Brevard, North Carolina.

Full History: Joan Yarbrough and Robert Cowan were a husband and wife duo piano team. They traveled with their two 7-foot Hamburg Steinways to many of their engagements throughout the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Additional concert tours took them to the Far East, Russia, Austria and Czechoslovakia.

Joan Yarbrough received a B.M. Degree with honors from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in 1960. She has also studied at the Salzburg Mozarteum, and the Royal Academy of Music in London, where she received the L.R.A.M in 1963 after studies with Franz Reizenstein.

Robert Cowan has studied with Joseph Raieff at Julliard (B.S. and M.S. Degrees), Cecile Genhart at the Eastman School of Music (D.M.A.), and with Harold Craxton as a Fulbright Scholar at the Royal Academy of Music (L.R.A.M.). Yarbrough and Cowan met in London in 1962 and were subsequently married. A busy concert career followed for them, with close to 300 concerts in the U.S., Europe and Mexico from 1964-1965. They have been duo-pianists-in-residence at the University of Montevallo in Montevallo, Alabama, and artist-faculty members at the Brevard Music Center in Brevard, North Carolina.

Yarbrough and Cowan commissioned and performed works for piano duo which include Wallingford Riegger's Variations for Two Pianos and Orchestra, Paul Creston's Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra, and Niels Viggo Bentzon's Symphonic Fantasy for Two Pianos and Orchestra.

From the guide to the Yarbrough and Cowan Collection, 1900-2007, 1967-1991, (International Piano Archives at Maryland)