The NZSO and Teddy Tahu Rhodes

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra heralds in summer with two exhilarating programmes that will leave you feeling uplifted no matter what the weather brings!

What better way to celebrate the finale of the 2008 Season than with dynamic NZSO Music Director Pietari Inkinen. Inkinen returns to New Zealand to conduct The Pacific Blue Tour, with none other than NZ-born international superstar, bass-baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes.

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'Most striking was Teddy Tahu Rhodes, making his Met debut as Ned Keene. This young New Zealand bass-baritone has generated a lot of buzz for his good looks, but it was his full, healthy singing that stole the show.'
Washington Post, March 2008

Returning home for his first ever national tour with the NZSO, Teddy Tahu Rhodes needs no introduction to New Zealand audiences. He has rapidly established himself as a star of the operatic world. He recently sang his first acclaimed Don Giovanni for Opera Australia, the world premiere of Rachel Portman's The Little Prince, Count Almaviva and Lescaut (Manon Lescaut) for Houston Grand Opera, Papageno for Welsh National Opera and Escamillo for Dallas Opera. Rhodes made his debut at the New York Met as Ned Keene in Peter Grimes in March 2008, and now comes direct to New Zealand from performing the title role of Billy Budd in Sante Fe and Sydney.

For the Pacific Blue Tour, Teddy Tahu Rhodes will sing arias by Puccini, Bizet, Handel, Mozart, Rossini and Bellini and the NZSO presents Richard Strauss' magnificent Don Juan and Till Eulenspiegel, as well as Stravinsky's Petrouchka and David Farquhar's much-loved Ring Round the Moon Suite

'The audience was clearly swept away by him ¨C and not just the women!' The Australian

Music Director Pietari Inkinen will close the 2008 Season on a high, following a year of outstanding reviews:

'Pietari Inkinen¡­ and his New Zealanders play like a world-class ensemble. Inkinen and company give a knockout account of the pulsing, shimmering, irresistibly stirring Eighth Symphony' The Star-Ledger

'Superb playing and brilliant conducting' The Dominion Post

'After interval, Inkinen's youth and vigour made one imagine how fresh and startling Mahler's First Symphony must have seemed in 1889. He zoomed between dynamic extremes and relished the mercurial mood-shifts¡­' NZ Herald.

For more information, check out the NZSO event listings on NZLive.com.