Debuting as soloist with orchestra at age eleven, pianist Lara Urrutia has appeared over a dozen times with symphony orchestras in the southern California region. As soloist, collaborator, and competition winner, she has given several hundred performances in venues across the southland including the Los Angeles Music Center, the Kodak Theater, and the Crystal Cathedral. In addition to performing in several states across the U.S., she has performed abroad in Chile, Mexico, and Austria.
She has appeared numerous times in concert with principal tubist of the Chicago Symphony, Gene Pokorny, and has collaborated with several current and former principal-chair members of major orchestras including the Chicago, Detroit, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, San Antonio, Winnipeg, and Beijing Symphonies, the New York City Ballet, the English National Opera, and the London, Vienna, and Berlin Philharmonics. Dr. Urrutia has also worked closely with composers Gunther Schuller, Libby Larsen, Joan Tower, and Eric Ewazen whose work she premiered along with trombonist Jeremy Wilson at the 2017 International Trombone Festival.
Her recording of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue was released by Gold Label in the spring of 2000. She can also be heard on Hymns to Forgotten Moons: Music of Arnold Schoenberg and Anthony Suter released by Centaur Entertainment in 2010. Her recordings have been broadcasted on air along with live performances including Copland’s Appalachian Spring with the University of Redlands Faculty Chamber ensemble.
Through performances, she has raised funds for children in need of surgery. She has also assisted in fund-raising for Child Help USA, the Home Mechanical Ventilation Program, and the City of Hope. She has been honored by KNX News Radio as an outstanding citizen, and by Child Help USA as Sweetheart of the Year for her volunteer work.
Dr. Urrutia graduated with honors from USC’s Thornton School of Music with a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Keyboard Collaborative Arts, an academic field in Music Teaching and Learning, and minor fields in Early Music and Arts Leadership. At USC, she studied with Kevin Fitz-Gerald, Alan L. Smith, Lucinda Carver, and Adam and Rotem Gilbert. At the University of Redlands where she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in Piano Performance, she studied with Louanne Long, and with Cordelia Hoffer at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria.
In addition to maintaining a highly active performing career in the southland, Dr. Urrutia currently heads the collaborative piano department at the University of Redlands Conservatory of Music where she has served on the piano faculty since 2007. Equally passionate about education, she received an Outstanding Teaching award from the university in 2013. Aside from piano and harpsichord, she is also an accomplished violinist and accordionist. She is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda, the national honorary music society, and Phi Kappa Phi, the national all-discipline honor society. When not seated at the piano or playing synths in a popular music cover band, you’ll find her walking her dogs and marveling over nature.
