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Ambre Hammond began piano studies with her mother at the age of 3 and gave her first concert at age 5. In 1990 at age 12, Ambre achieved a world record when she received the Associate and Licentiate Diplomas of music in the same year. At 16 she received the First Prize in her first International Music Competition held in Argentina, South America. The following year she was invited to return to Argentina to perform the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No.3 as her debut performance with the Cordoba Symphony Orchestra. This performance was recorded live and released as a CD, which has been acclaimed by the Rachmaninoff Society of USA as one of the finest recordings ever made of this piece. At 16, Ambre recorded and released a CD of music by Franz Liszt titled 'Devotion' which was funded by Australian artist Arthur Boyd who was astounded with Ambre's natural ability and also invited her to be first Artist-In Residence at his Shoalhaven Property 'Bundanon', on the South Coast of Australia. Ambre has performed both solo and with Orchestra throughout Switzerland, England, Italy, Spain, Poland, North and South America, New Zealand and China to consistent acclaim from both critics and public alike. Recently she has continued to perform not only the great classics but showed a flair for jazz and blues by combining talents with James Morrison in a series of concerts displaying a fusion of musical styles. A recent performance was with the Auckland Philharmonic Orchestra in New Zealand at which she delighted audiences playing the magical Rachmaninoff 2nd piano concerto as well as teaming up with James Morrison for some blues and other jazz standards. Renowned Hollywood film writer and composer Lalo Schifrin was recently commissioned to write a very special Concerto-style work for Jazz Trumpet, Classical Piano and Orchestra especially for Ambre and James Morrison. Now completed, Ambre recently returned from Los Angeles where she played the piece to Lalo who has dedicated the Concerto to her. Preparations are being made to record the Concerto in Sydney in May. They will then perform this work throughout Europe, USA and Australia with the World Premiere performance to be held in Sydney at the Opera House on July 19 and 21. One of her current projects is the recording of a CD of music commissioned by Ambre from several of Sydney's finest young jazz musicians. They have written 'classical' compositions with overtones of jazz, blues and the fusion of many other styles to create unique pieces of music which Ambre looks forward to presenting to her audiences to demonstrate the creative brilliance that is abundant in Australia's young musicians. It is important to Ambre to give back to the community through her ability as much as possible and she has been named Ambassador of the SMILE Foundation, a newly formed Sydney based Medical Research and Philanthropy Company and is also closely involved with the Brain Foundation of Australia. Ambre is blessed with not only artistic brilliance and technical prowess of the highest order, but has a physical beauty and presence that leaves her listeners in awe of such a young, energetic and gifted talent. Ambre has the communicative skills to be able to share her passion for the music and delight audiences everywhere from age 1 to 100.
