Stalight, symphonies and Simon

Simon Tedeschi, picture Cole Bennetts.

Starlight in Symphony presents internationally renowned Australian pianist Simon Tedeschi at the Pilbeam Theatre on 18 June.

Simon will perform the dramatic Grieg Piano Concerto and Gershwin’s jazz influenced classic, Rhapsody in Blue with Rockhampton Symphony Orchestra.

He is one of Australia’s most renowned classical pianists, winner of the Young Performer of the Year Award (Australia), the Creativity Foundation’s Legacy Award (USA), and the New York Young Jewish Pianist Award. Recipient of a Centenary of Federation Medal, he has performed for audiences, royalty and world leaders worldwide.

Tedeschi performed his first Mozart piano concerto in the Sydney Opera House at age nine. Recent engagements have included as soloist with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra; Sydney Festival, Art Gallery of NSW, performances of Echoes of the Jazz Age – Tedeschi’s third creative collaboration with Australian theatre icon John Bell AO OBE.

RSO Conductor Owen Clarke, again brings to Central Queensland his professional conducting talents, honed whilst Director of Music for the Royal NZ Air Force and Navy Bands, Auckland Philharmonia and Christchurch Symphony.

Audiences will swoon to Mozart’s popular 40th Symphony and find it hard to resist tapping along with Aaron Copland’s Hoe-Down and other well-known classics.

Rockhampton Symphony Orchestra, performing since 2018, features the talents of fifty local musicians for “Starlight in Symphony”;