Robert Scholz (pianist)

Robert Scholz (; 16 October 1902 – 11 October 1986) was an Austrian-born American pianist, conductor, composer and teacher. He achieved fame as a pianist, especially in Austria during the Twenties and Thirties in a piano duo with his brother Heinz Scholz with whom he also published the first authoritative collection of Mozart’s works for piano. After emigrating to the United States in 1938 he became a well-known conductor and founder of the American Chamber Orchestra in New York. In 1963 the US State Department invited him to teach in Taiwan as part of a scholarly exchange program. Here he achieved lasting fame as a conductor and especially as the founding father of Taiwan’s piano tradition. Most influential piano professors in Taiwan today can trace their roots back to his teachings. He died in Taipei in 1986. Life Genealogy Robert Scholz was born in Steyr, Austria, on 16 October 1902. His father, Karl Scholz, was a store manager, his mother, Johanna Mayr, a soprano who met and corresponded with Anton Bruckner. His elder brother, the pianist Heinz Scholz (1897-1988), was president of the Mozarteum Salzburg in 1964. Some genealogical research of the Scholz family from 1750 until th