Dr. Marie Rubis Bauer is Archdiocesan Director of Music – Cathedral Organist at Saint Cecilia Cathedral in Omaha, Nebraska which houses the landmark Martin Pasi, Op. 14 dual temperament pipe organ. Since 2019 she has also served as organ instructor on the University of Nebraska Omaha faculty.

Rubis Bauer holds masters and doctoral degrees in organ from the University of Kansas, as well as an undergraduate degree from Augustana College in Sioux Falls, SD. Her majors teachers include: James Higdon, Mary Helen Schmidt, Roger Davis, and Cherry Rhodes; significant mentors in organ and harpsichord include Susan Marchant, James David Christie and Edward Parmentier.

Rubis Bauer has performed for regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists, the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, and the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians. She has been a featured performer and conductor on seven compact disks, including solo discs of music by composers Petr Eben and Dan Locklair.  As organist and harpsichordist she has performed solo concerts and concertos throughout the United States and in Germany, France, Sweden, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland.  Her performances have been aired on Pipedreams produced by Public Radio International. She has been featured on the inaugural series of significant American organs, including Martin Pasi organs at Saint Cecilia Cathedral, Omaha and Hope Lutheran Church, Shawnee, KS, the Paul Fritts organ at Princeton Theological Seminary, the Hellmuth Wolff organ at the Bales Organ Recital Hall at the University of Kansas, and the C.B. Fisk organ at Pittsburg State University. Other American venues have included the University of Notre Dame, the University of Alabama, the Calvin College, Dordt College, and a variety of American cathedrals, including Grace Episcopal, Topeka, KS, Grace and Holy Trinity, Kansas City, St. Joseph Cathedral, Columbus, OH, Cathedral of the Assumption, Louisville, KY, and the Cathedral of the Light in Oakland, CA.

Rubis Bauer is founding artistic director of the Omaha Bach Festivaland Omaha Baroque, an organization dedicated to the study and performance of early music. While in Kansas City, she was harpsichordist for the ensembles Kansas City Chamber Orchestra, Tastowerk Baroque Trio, and The Early Music Consort in Kansas City and has performed numerous organ and harpsichord concertos with various ensembles, including the complete Brandenburg Concerti of Bach on multiple occasions. Rubis Bauer has collaborated extensively with her husband, Dr. Michael Bauer, professor of Organ and Church Music at the University of Kansas. With Michael she has published several articles, and is a contributing author to the book Leading the Church’s Song (Augsburg Fortress Press). Recently they performed the complete organ works of Dieterich Buxtehude. She has also written a chapter in the book Duruflé: The Last Impressionist (Scarecrow Press). Her choral compositions are published by Hinshaw and Morning Star Music publishers.

In an administrative role, Rubis Bauer has served as the national placement director for the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians, on the board of directors for Director of Music Ministry Division of NPM and was Director of the American Guild of Organist’s 2012 National Competition in Organ Improvisation in Nashville. Currently she serves on the steering committee of the Conference of Roman Catholic Cathedral Musicians. In 2004 she represented the United States in Fatima, Portugal at the International Congress on Liturgical Music. She has been a keynote speaker for a National Conference of the Federation of Diocesan Liturgical Commissions. She alsoserved as Director of Education for the presenting organization Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, launching what has grown to become one of the United States’ premier arts outreach programs: MusiConnection.

Rubis Bauer joined the staff at Saint Cecilia as Cathedral Organist in 2003. Since 2005 she has directed the Cathedral and Archdiocesan Choirs and serves as Director of the School of Music in the Saint Cecilia Institute for Sacred Liturgy, Music and the Arts, which offers course work in liturgy and music; applied lessons in piano, voice, harp, violin, and flute; and an organ academy tutoring twenty-four youth, adult, and parish organists in the region each year. Under her direction the Saint Cecilia Cathedral Choir sings at all solemn liturgies in Saint Cecilia cathedral and presents major sacred choral works; recent performances include the Duruflé Requiem, Fauré Requiem, Handel Ode to Saint Cecilia, Charpentier Te Deum, Mozart Mass in D, K194, Buxtehude Magnificat and the medieval liturgical drama, The Shepherds. In 2010-2011 she provided leadership throughout the Archdiocese of Omaha, teaching at thirty gatherings for musicians, priests, deacons, and laity in the unique initiative Forward Together: Welcoming the New Roman Missal.  This extensive formation program was designed to support renewal of musical liturgy and raising the quality of Roman Catholic liturgical music and the skill of liturgical musicians and clergy.

Rubis Bauer joined Independent Concert Artists in 2012. She is available for solo concerts or concertos, performing either a diverse repertoire or programs of early music on organ, harpsichord, and lautenwerck, and in duet with Erica Rubis, viola da gambist, (Bloomington, Indiana). In August 2013, she will embark with husband Michael Bauer on a concert tour including historic Renaissance and Baroque organs in Austria and Northern Germany.