Beebe Freitas

American pianist, organist, voice trainer and teacher Beebe Freitas was born Beatrice Pauline Botty in Youngstown, Ohio on 28 August 1938. At Oberlin College she studied piano with Edward Mattos, at Boston University (on a scholarship in accompanying) with Alexander Borovsky and at Juilliard with Beveridge Webster.

She was rehearsal pianist for the Collegiate Chorale and the Camerata Singers, working with Robert Shaw, Leonard Bernstein, William Steinberg, Joseph Krips and Thomas Schippers.

She moved to Honolulu in 1966 and, in addition to coaching privately, became Head of Music at Hawaii Opera Theatre and organist for the First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu and the Punahou School Chapel Program.

As an accompanist she worked with Frederica von Stade, David Shifrin, Leonard Rose, Sylvia McNair, Bernard Greenhouse, Yo-Yo Ma and other performers.

Beebe Freitas died in Aina Haina, Hawaii on 17 February 2018, aged seventy-nine.