Few artists have ever burst onto the international scene with such immediate and overwhelming success as Arabella Steinbacher. Since her 2004 debut in Paris, she has been on a meteoric ascent, appearing at the major concert venues in Europe, the U.S., and Asia, and making critically acclaimed recordings. One of the reasons for her success is her choice to play rarely heard works as well as the standards. A look at the variety in her sizable repertory can astonish string music enthusiasts: among composers beginning with B, it contains not just the big three (Bach, Beethoven, Brahms), but Berg, Barber, and Bruch; it moves on to Chausson, Dvorák, Hartmann, Lalo, Milhaud, Mozart, Piazzolla, Prokofiev, Sarasate, Schubert, Shostakovich, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky, and many more. And her work in the chamber realm has drawn the same kind of plaudits as have her concertante performances. Steinbacher has already made more than a half-dozen recordings, available on Orfeo and PentaTone.Arabella Steinbacher was born in Munich, Germany, on November 14, 1981. Her Japanese-born mother was a singer and her German father once served as répétiteur at the Bavarian State Opera. Steinbacher was extremely precocious, studying violin from age three. From age nine she received instruction from Ana Chumachenko at the Munich Academy of Music. Steinbacher was later mentored by Ivry Gitlis and aided by a scholarship from the Anne-Sophie Mutter Foundation (2001-2005). After her 2004 debut in Paris offers to perform around the world flooded in. Her first recording, the Khachaturian Violin Concerto, was issued that same year on Orfeo. In both 2005 and 2006 she received the German Record Critics Awards, the first for her Orfeo disc of the Milhaud violin concertos and the second for her CD of Shostakovich concertos, also on Orfeo. Steinbacher's June 2006 recital debut in New York received high praise from The New York Times, and her major American orchestral debut the following year with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in the Sibelius concerto drew raves from the Chicago Tribune.
Meanwhile, Steinbacher continued to draw acclaim for her recordings: her 2006 Violino Latino (Orfeo), which contained works by Piazzolla, Ponce, de Falla, and others, deftly conveyed her idiomatic grasp of Latin music. Steinbacher's concert schedule has remained busy: her 2008-2009 season included debuts with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields in London; her 2009-2010 season included a debut appearance with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.