ROBERT CHAMBERLAIN is a versatile and accomplished pianist, with interests ranging from period performance to contemporary music and with specialisations including chamber and ensemble music. He studied for Bachelors and Masters degrees in Australia under Max Cooke, in Vienna as a winner of the Apex/Robert Stolz Scholarship, and also at the Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada.

He has appeared nationally and internationally as a pedagogy presenter, also as adjudicator and music competition jury member, including Ars Nova International Piano Competition 2012 in Singapore, ANZCA Modern Piano and Violin Competition 2012 in Bangkok, Thailand, and Malaysian Youth Music Festivals on numerous occasions. From 2004 to 2013 he developed and directed the Team of Pianists’ annual Spring Piano School, an intensive enrichment school-holiday program for school aged pianists aged from 6 to 18 years, which attracted young pianists and teacher observers from Victoria, interstate and overseas.

As a performer, concert engagements have taken him to Turkey, Malaysia, Brunei, Thailand, Canada, as well as around Australia. He has appeared with leading international and Australian musicians, including Danish violinist Benedikte Daamgard in a series of four Australian recitals, with French-Canadian soprano Chantal Dionne in a 2011 recital in French-speaking Canada in the Été musical series. Over the years, he has performed numerous two piano programs with Team of Pianists colleague Darryl Coote, chamber music with Sydney Symphony Orchestra friends Marina Marsden and Justine Marsden, period instrument performances of Brahms with clarinettist Craig Hill, collaborations with chamber groups including the Hamer String Quartet and members of the Flinders Quartet and of Quartz, and collaborated with instrumentalists such as flautist Megan Sterling (Hong Kong Philharmonic), saxophonist Jason Xanthoudakis, clarinettists David Griffiths and Phillip Miechel, flautist Derek Jones, and with vocalists such as sopranos Emily Xiao Wang and Michelle Marie Cook and Louise Page, as well as some years exploring the piano, violin, cello trio repertoire with Isin Cakmakcioglu and Rachel Atkinson, whilst also presenting the Australian premieres of contemporary works for this combination.

Other concert performances with leading Australian musicians have included programs based around Scottish, Australian and animal themes with vocal colleagues Justine Anderson, Vivien Hamilton and Jeannie Marsh from Icon Trio, and various chamber music programs of duos and trios, with composers ranging from Bach to Julian Yu, with Robert Schubert clarinet and Josephine Vains cello.

For many years he has performed and recorded two-piano repertoire with Team of Pianist’s partner Darryl Coote, including Spanish and Spanish influenced works for two pianos by Manuel Infante and Maurice Ravel on the Team’s CD New Norcia – A Spanish Rhapsody. Robert has also recorded on 15 other CDs for a number of labels including Tall Poppies, Naxos, Move Records and VoxAustralis.

Recording projects for 2025 have included the premiere recording of Piano Sonata no 2 (2025) and Winter’s Sun on the Beach by Australian composer Lachlan Brown, both released in November 2025, while other recitals in 2025 have included trios by Nino Rota and John Ireland with Robert Schubert clarinet and Josephine Vains cello, as well repertoire for solo piano and for two pianos, four and eight hands with the other partners of the Team of Pianists, Darryl Coote, Rohan Murray and Kevin Suherman.

As a scholar, Robert has edited, with violinist Marina Marsden (Sydney Symphony Orchestra), a critical edition of Australian composer Margaret Sutherland’s Sonata for Violin and Piano (Currency Press, 2000), which they also recorded on the Tall Poppies label. He has also written reviews and articles and his research and presentation interests have included teaching and learning processes in piano teaching and performance, creativity in piano pedagogy, and style and technique in piano performance. A paper on creativity and piano teaching from the 2015 Australasian Piano Pedagogy Conference may be found via the APPC website and an article about the world of the digital piano here. Robert has also used his small YouTube Channel to share insights and approaches to the teaching, learning and performance of some piano repertoire and technical work.

Robert has been on the piano faculty at the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance at Monash University since the 1990’s. In 2019 he filled a temporary 12-month role as Co-ordinator of Piano in that school. He served also as Secretary of the Organising Committee for the 15th Australasian Piano Pedagogy Conference, which was held at Monash University, Clayton Campus, in July 2024.