Lenoir native Joseph Robinson will perform with the Western Piedmont Symphony at 8 p.m. tonight at J.E. Broyhill Civic Center along with his daughter Rebecca.

Robinson served with great distinction as principal oboe of the New York Philharmonic from 1978 until 2005, despite never attending a conservatory. Prior to his New York appointment, he performed in the Atlanta Symphony with Robert Shaw for six years and was instructor of oboe at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts for four. His oboe teachers were John Mack and Marcel Tabuteau. He holds a B.A. degree and Honorary Doctorate from Davidson College, where he served as Trustee, and a Master's degree from the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University. For 27 years, he served as Head of Oboe Studies at the Manhattan School of Music in New York. His earliest musical training was in the Lenoir High School Band.

From January 2006 until June 2009, Robinson was Artist in Residence at Duke University. He is presently Visiting Distinguished Professor of Oboe at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida and he returns to the University of North Carolina School of the Arts in January 2010 to replace as interim John Ellis, who replaced him 31 years ago.

Robinson and his violinist wife, Mary Kay, are parents of three daughters, the youngest of whom, Rebecca, is making her solo orchestral debut with the Western Piedmont Symphony here tonight. Katie is associate director of the Center for Sustainability at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, the mother of two young sons and an about-to-be-published author. Jody is a pediatric psychiatrist practicing with Kaiser-Permanente in Denver.