Simon Tedeschi is one of Australia’s most renowned classical pianists. A recipient of the Young Performer of the Year Award, the Creativity Foundation’s Legacy Award (USA), the New York Young Jewish Pianist Award, and a Centenary of Federation Medal, he has performed for audiences, royalty, and world leaders across the globe—from the Sydney Opera House to Carnegie Hall, via the Abu Dhabi and Shanghai Arts Festivals. An ARIA-nominated recording artist, regular guest on ABC TV, ABC Classic, and Radio National, Simon’s reach extends into film, featuring in celebrated director Scott Hicks’ The Musical Mind: A Portrait in Process, alongside Daniel Johns, Ben Folds, and David Helfgott. The film won Best Cinematography at the 2025 AACTA Awards.
Acclaimed by critics and peers as “true greatness” (SMH), Tedeschi first studied with Joyce Billings, then with Neta Maughan (1990–2000), during which he performed his first Mozart piano concerto at the Sydney Opera House, aged nine. He later completed an Artist Diploma at the Longy School of Music at Bard College (Cambridge, MA) where he studied with Randall Hodgkinson and Peter Serkin and toured extensively through the US. Since returning to Sydney, he has performed as soloist with all major Australasian symphony orchestras and tours nationally for festivals and presenters including Musica Viva Australia.
Tedeschi co-wrote and toured the Sydney Opera House’s Meeting Mozart children’s show (produced by CDP), with four sell-out seasons in Sydney alone, and has created a number of productions blending words and music—for Monkey Baa Theatre, and with Australian theatre icon John Bell AO OBE. In 2024, he co-created When George Met Arnold with Roger Benedict, exploring the friendship of George Gershwin and Arnold Schoenberg, premiering to a packed Sydney Opera House Concert Hall with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and integrated film.
In 2025, Tedeschi appeared as soloist with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and the National Doctors Orchestra (Sydney), with further performances alongside John Bell, chamber concerts for Live at Yours with Yamen Saadi (Concertmaster, Vienna Philharmonic), and in The Flowers of Peace WWII Requiem (Canberra). He toured Meeting Mozart to India and China, and continued his forays into jazz, performing a sold-out concert in Jazz at the Lounge (at Sydney’s Concourse), and in his duo with jazz violinist/vocalist George Washingmachine, including in Four Winds Windsong Series (NSW). The current season brings a national tour as guest pianist with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Orange Chamber Music Festival, further performances of ‘Bright Star’ with John Bell, for Jazz At the Lounge (The Concourse), and concerts across NSW regional centres from Avoca Beach Theatre to Liverpool Powerhouse and the Southern Highlands (NSW).
Tedeschi’s latest album, Debussy – Ravel, with Roger Benedict, was nominated for the 2023 ARIA Award for Best Classical Album, joining his acclaimed recordings for ABC Classics/Universal Music—including The Gershwin Collection, Pictures at an Exhibition, Enoch Arden (R. Strauss), and concertos by Mozart, Tchaikovsky, and Grieg.
Alongside performing, Tedeschi is gaining renown as a writer. After completing a Master’s in Literature (Deakin University) and winning the 2022 Calibre Essay Prize, his literary debut Fugitive (Upswell Publishing) was shortlisted for both the 2023 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards and the Judith Wright Calanthe Award for Poetry. He has spoken at the Sydney Writers’ Festival, among others.
Latest News
World Premiere with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra of a new show co-written/created by Simon Tedeschi and Roger Benedict, about the friendship between composers George Gershwin and Arnold Schoenberg, plays to a near sell-out Sydney Opera House Concert Hall, May 2024: read more here.
25 years on from Shine, Simon features in Academy Award-winning director Scott Hicks’ film, The Musical Mind (2023), alongside Ben Folds, Daniel Johns and David Helfgott, with artwork by Loribelle Spirovski. Read more here.
Simon Tedeschi’s latest album with violist Roger Benedict, ‘Ravel – Debussy’ earns a 2023 ARIA Award nomination for ‘Best Classical Album’.
Simon Tedeschi and John Bell AO OBE have created and penned two new shows together, which will be touring in 2023-2024. ‘Words & Music’ and ‘With Love, Amadeus’ each blend poetry with piano, telling stories and revealing moments from personal touring experiences, and from Mozart’s letters. Read more here.
Reviews of Simon’s March performances of Rachmaninoff’s 4th piano concerto with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra at Sydney Opera House: “a deceptively effortless performance… Tedeschi’s relaxed dexterity lent an easy logic to music that can seem excessively complicated… Tedeschi generated the requisite fireworks” (Limelight Magazine); “Tedeschi’s legato is astonishing … giving Rachmaninov’s music a diamond-cut clarity” (Harriet Cunningham); “a revelation… simply superb” (J-Wire).
