Piano Man: The Music of Billy Joel


Steven Reineke is one of North America's leading conductors of popular music and is in his second decade as Music Director of The New York Pops at Carnegie Hall. He is the Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and Principal Pops Conductor of the Houston and Toronto Symphony Orchestras.

Reineke is a frequent guest conductor and can be seen on the podium with the Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit Symphony Orchestras.

On stage, Mr. Reineke creates and collaborates with a range of leading artists in hip-hop, R & B, Broadway, television, and rock including Killer Mike, Maxwell, Common, Kendrick Lamar, Nas, Ne-Yo, Bob Weir, Trey Anastasio, Barry Manilow, Cynthia Erivo, Ben Rector, Cody Fry, Sutton Foster, Amos Lee, Dispatch, Jason Mraz, and Ben Folds, amongst others. In 2024, he led the NSO on PBS’ Next at the Kennedy Center featuring Ben Folds DeClassified with Jacob Collier, Laufey, and dodie. He was previously seen with the NSO on PBS’ Great Performances with hip-hop legend Nas performing his seminal album “Illmatic." Reineke is the conductor on “Ben Folds Live with The National Symphony Orchestra and William Shatner’s “So Fragile, So Blue” with The National Symphony Orchestra.

As the creator of hundreds of orchestral arrangements, Reineke’s work is performed worldwide and can be heard on numerous Cincinnati Pops Orchestra recordings. His symphonic works “Celebration Fanfare,” “Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” and “Casey at the Bat” are performed frequently in North America, including performances by the New York Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic. His “Sun Valley Festival Fanfare” was used to commemorate the Sun Valley Summer Symphony’s pavilion, and his pieces “Festival Te Deum” and “Swan’s Island Sojourn” were debuted by the Cincinnati Symphony and Cincinnati Pops Orchestras. His numerous wind ensemble compositions are published by the C.L. Barnhouse Company and are performed by concert bands perennially.

A native of Ohio, Reineke is a graduate of Miami University of Ohio (2020 Alumnus Distinguished Achievement Medal) where he earned Bachelor of Music degrees with honors in both trumpet performance and music composition. He currently resides in New York City with his husband Eric Gabbard.