Judy Bailey (pianist)

Judy Bailey OAM is a New Zealand-born pianist, jazz musician and composer who has lived in Australia since the 1960s.

Music career

Bailey was born in Auckland and raised in Whangarei, a town in the north of New Zealand. As a young child she learned ballet, followed by piano and theory when she was 10 years old. She graduated from Trinity College London when she was 16.

Bailey moved to Australia in 1960,^[1] spending most of her time in Sydney.^[2] She performed live, on TV, and on recordings.^[1]

Bailey is a lecturer in jazz composition and jazz piano at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music^[1] and is musical director of the Sydney Youth Jazz Ensemble.^[3]

In 1973, Bailey became the pianist on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation children's radio show Kindergarten, which often featured presenters from Play School, notably Barbara Frawley, Alister Smart, Don Spencer and Geoff Ayling.^[4]

Awards

• 2004: Order of Australia for services to music and education.^[5]
• 2008: Award for Distinguished Services to Australian Music at the Annual Classical Music Awards.^[6]
• 2014: Inducted into the Graeme Bell Jazz Hall of Fame by Jazz Australia.^[5]

Discography

• 2005 The Spritely Ones
• 2009 I Never Go Out in the Rain
• 2016 You & the Night & the Music^[7]

References