Sixty years ago you would not have been able to hear the main work in Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s latest concert, even though it was written 200 years before by the greatest living composer of that time.

The score to Joseph Haydn’s Cello Concerto No. 1 in C, Op. 101 lay dormant for two centuries until someone unearthed it in a Prague museum in 1961. Although still overshadowed by the popular second concerto, it has since been recorded and performed by every player worth their salt, and no wonder – it contains perhaps the most beautiful slow movement of any cello concerto.

It is also a work perfectly suited to the elegant and sweet style of Chinese Australian cellist Li-Wei Qin who has been impressing audiences both as a soloist and chamber musician since winning the Silver Medal at the Tchaikovsky International Competition in 1998, the same year his family migrated to Melbourne from Shanghai.

Now aged 47, Li-Wei juggles his concert career with teaching posts in Singapore and Shanghai, as well as being a visiting professor at the Royal Northern College of Music in England. Visits to Sydney are less frequent than before...