The Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra opens its 2010-11 season this weekend with an internationally renowned piano prodigy.
Fifteen-year-old George Li is capturing the imagination of audiences around the country with his performances. One reviewer said the 10th-grader has "a talent and technique somewhat larger than this solar system."
In August he snagged first place in the inaugural Thomas and Evon Cooper International Competition, beating out more than 40 pianists from around the world.
The Massachusetts native took home $10,000 and guest performances with orchestras in Shanghai and Beijing, as well as a full scholarship to Oberlin Conservatory.
When he joins the volunteer SASO this weekend, he will perform Chopin's First Piano Concerto, the same piece he performed to win the Cooper competition.
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Li won his first piano competition when he was 6 and started performing publicly three years later. His Carnegie Hall debut was televised and he has performed throughout the world.
SASO's season-opening concert also includes Richard White's "Celebration," a new piece the orchestra commissioned to honor its major sponsor, Dorothy Vanek.
Seventy-five percent of the proceeds from advance ticket sales to Sunday's concert will benefit Tucson-area nonprofit arts organizations, said Music Director Linus Lerner.
That performance, at St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church, also will feature a display of local artists' works curated by the Muscular Dystrophy Association to go along with the orchestra's performance of Mussorgsky/Ravel's "Pictures At An Exhibition."
For more on the concert, see Friday's The Arts section in the Arizona Daily Star.
