Roberto Urbay studied at Escuela Nacional de Arte in Havana, Cuba where he was instructed by Margot Rojas Mendoza and Silvio Rodríguez Cárdenas. He was awarded a scholarship to study at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. There, he studied with Evgeny Mogilevsky and got the diploma of Master of Fine Arts with a specialization as Concert Pianist and Piano Professor in 1983. He was also awarded grants to make postgraduate courses in Hungary on Liszt and Bartók's work in 1986 and 1987 under the guidance of such illustrious pianists as Georges Cziffra and Zoltan Kocsis.
Roberto Urbay was awarded the UNEAC Prize - Unión Nacional de Escritores y Artistas de Cuba - in 1973, as well as the Special Prize in Chamber Music at the Grandstand for Young Interpreters at the Interpodium Festival in Bratislava (1977). He also participated in three famous International Competitions: Queen Elizabeth, in Brussels (1978), Van Cliburn, in Texas (1981) and Liszt, in Budapest (1986).
His interpreting art has been appreciated in Belgium, Russia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Italy, Spain, Albania, Germany, Hungary, Kazajstan, Korea, Japan, the USA, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, and Cuba, where he has interpreted an extensive and well varied repertory in solo concerts, chamber music and concerts with orchestra, in festivals, competitions and international tours.
With over thirty years of teaching the art of the piano, he has been professor at prestigious musical institutions, such as the Instituto Superior de Arte in Havana and at the Music Department that belongs to the Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, in Mendoza, Argentina, where he is a full professor since 1995. His students have won more than 50 prizes in diverse piano competitions in many countries. He has been President and Member of the Jury in contests and competitions. Besides he has given improvement courses on Mozart and Liszt's work, Latin-American Music, The Piano in the Romantic Period. He has also lectured Master Classes, Seminars and Conferences.
He has recorded for the discographic labels of Magic Music, Egrem and Colibrí. Many of his recordings, in CD as well as in DVD, have been prize-winning in the Feria Discográfica Internacional, "Cubadisco", such as: Harold Gramatges' Complete works for Piano (1999), the Heitor Villa-Lobos' Five Piano Concertos (2007), in which Urbay interpreted the Concierto Nº 5 and Mozart in Havana, with 4 sonatas for Piano (2008), recordings that have awarded a prize under the categories of Great Prize and Solo Player.
Bach, Handel, Scarlatti, Soler, Galuppi, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Bartók, Debussy, Poulenc, Villa-Lobos, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Shchedrin, Aleksandrov, Albéniz, Granados, de Falla, Gershwin, Bernstein and Moleiros.
The Cuban composers: Manuel Saumell, Ignacio Cervantes, Ernesto Lecuona, Alejandro García Caturla, Harold Gramatges, José Ardévol, Edgardo Martín, Hilario González, Fabio Landa, Leo Brouwer, Carlos Fariñas, Héctor Angulo, Roberto Valera, Carlos Malcolm, Armando Rodriguez Ruidiaz and Juan Piñera.
Urbay is only 20 years old and he already has the interpretative maturity of an outstanding pianist. (Liszt, Concerto N° 2) (Juan Antonio Pola, Bohemia, Cuba, 1974)
His performance is brilliant in Chopin and Liszt, causing a major impact. (Gazet van Antwerpen, Bélgica, 1978)
He is a sensitive and distinguished musician. (La Libre Belgique, Bélgica, 1978)
The Ballad Opus 23 (Chopin) took a high poetic intensity under his fingers. (Andres Mean, La Cite, Bélgica, 1978)
Roberto Urbay is a gifted pianist, a mature musician, owner of a warm temperament, a great sound and a high degree virtuosity. (Evgeni Mogilevsky, Moscow, Russia, 1983)
The artist conveyed the noble expression of the music, full of feelings, keeping in mind the characteristics of each work, which require high technical and artistic skills. His performance was very impressive to the public. (Rodong Simun, Pyongyang, Corea, 1987)
(...) the performance of the pianist, full of transparent and emotional images, communicates the goodness and beauty between different periods of time and people. (Limos Dizdari, Drita, Tirana, Albania, 1987)
Urbay is a pianist that has imagination, sensitivity and a passionate temperament, yet precise and controlled; capable to sing with poignant intensity and to achieve effects of stamina and virtuosity. (Hoy, Dominican Republic, 1990)
(...) memorable for the beauty of sound, careful phrasing, sustained control of a cantabile and very lyrical playing, that reveals a sensitive pianist with broad culture and vast communicative skills. (Shostakovich, Concerto N° 2)(Granma, La Habana, Cuba, 1990)
An artist of wide experience. plays with full maturity and lyricism display, achieving the difficult balance between the interpretative creativity and respect for different styles. (Los Andes, Mendoza, Argentina, 1992)
Roberto Urbay is a fulfilled musician. His vast culture has opened up for him all the roads through the history of sounds, with a broad outlook on epoches, styles and concepts. With great talent and purified technical skills, he has preferred to cope with the music of the 20th Century, particularly with contemporary Cuban music. His personal link with my musical work has made him an indisputable interpreter of my piano and chamber music. That is the reason why I selected him to make this reconding. Let me express here my acknowledgement of the high degree of fidelity he accompliched in his whole performance. (Harold Gramatges, Composer, La Habana, Cuba, 1997)
Exquisite, poignant, and eager… unforgettable and passionate performance (Saint-Saëns, Concerto N° 2) (UNO, Mendoza, Argentina, 2000)
Artist of international category demonstrated a phenomenal technique and gave expressive relief to his part. (El Mercurio, Santiago de Chile, 2001)
The debut (at the Colon Theater) of Cuban Pianist Roberto Urbay in Liszt's Second Concerto was impressive, (...) he plays in true grand manner, assuming the retorics of the Romantics with conviction. (Buenos Aires Herald, Argentina, 2003)
We had moments of true spiritual joy with the performance of Mozart´s sonatas offered by the pianist Roberto Urbay. This artist confronted the work of the Salzburg´s Genius, with the wisdom of a man that knows how to reach the most concealed moments of the master´s work, with the accomplice smile of someone who has managed the artistic fact with the precise gesture. Urbay is a mature pianist and in full rise, quality that makes him exceptional. He needs no fuss of any nature. He triumphs with the humbleness of the great ones. (Juan Piñera, CMBF Radio Musical Nacional, web site, 2006)
Fabulous performance, thrilling and brave (…) a pianist that gathers together great virtuousness and absolute seriousness in his musical projection. (About the "Twelve Caribbean Studies" of Roberto Valera) (Roberto Valera, composer, CMBF Radio Musical Nacional, web site, 2006)
The performance of the pianist Roberto Urbay in the Concerto Number 5 (Villa-Lobos), dated from 1954, was of truly very high quality. Urbay is a mature and experienced musician that dominated the text and the essence of the work. He showed the best of himself in quality and culture of the sound, and in the virtuousness that he always knew how to place faithfully to the service of music. (Jorge López Marín, La Ventana, Portal informativo de Casa de las Américas, 2006).
(...) excellent and superb interpretation of the Rhapsody in Blue. (El Diario, La Paz, Bolivia, 2008)
(...) Cuban virtuosity and brilliance: The music on the double CD is brilliantly performed by Roberto Urbay, who emerged as one of the young pianists in Cuba in the 1970s. Roberto Urbay is a virtuoso which can be heard on the expressive and breathtaking "Estudio de contrastes" (1974). (Kilemyan "Kiman", Copenhagen, Denmark, 2008).
(...) the time-honored cuban pianist Roberto Urbay, owner of a vibrant version that provoked a warm and long lasting applause. (Tchaikovsky's Concert for Piano N° 1) (La Nación.com, Argentina, 2008).
1997: Harold Gramatges: Obra Completa para Piano (The Complete Piano Works) (EGREM 2CD)
1997: Homenaje a Harold Gramatges (Homage to Harold Gramatges) (Magic Music)
2002: Antología Pianística Cubana Vol. I (Cuban Piano Anthology Vol. I) (EGREM)
2002: Antología Pianística Cubana Vol. II (Cuban Piano Anthology Vol. II) (EGREM)
2004: Harold Gramatges: Mis Versiones Preferidas (My favorite Versions) (EGREM)
2004: Harold Gramatges: Obra Completa para Piano Vol. I (The Complete Piano Works Vol. I) (EGREM)
2004: Harold Gramatges: Obra Completa para Piano Vol. II (The Complete Piano Works Vol. II) (EGREM)
2006: Heitor Villa-Lobos: Cinco Conciertos para Piano y Orquesta (Five Piano Concertos) (Colibrí 2CD)
2006: Heitor Villa-Lobos: Cinco Conciertos para Piano y Orquesta (Five Piano Concertos) (Colibrí DVD)
2007: Harold Gramatges: La Magia de la Música (Factoría Autor DVD)
2007: Mozart en La Habana (Colibrí 3DVD)
listen samples in Amazon.com
