The Tony Tixier Trio brings an exciting style of jazz to the Rodale Community Room for the “Jazz Upstairs” series, 7:30 p.m. Aug. 17, Miller Symphony Hall, Allentown.

Tixier, a French native, began piano studies at age six. By age 14, he received a degree in Classical Piano. One of his teachers encouraged him to study jazz.

”The teacher was kind of square, classical. I thought, ‘No way.’ Jazz was for old people, people who are cheesy. I was thinking more of swing jazz,” Tixier says in a phone interview.

Nonetheless, Tixier gave it a try in the basement of the conservatory where the jazz studies took place. He listened to Herbie Hancock, John Coltrane, a Buster Williams trio DVD his dad bought, and to other jazz greats.

“In a couple months, I really started to get into it. Four years later, I was teaching jazz.” At 18, he was the youngest teacher in the conservatory’s jazz department.

Tixier has recorded the albums “Fall In Flowers,” “Electric Trane,” “Parallel Worlds,” and “Dream Pursuit,” and is set to release a new trio album, “Life Of Sensitive Creatures.”

Tixier has collaborated with high-profile jazz artists such as saxophonist Seamus Blake and trumpeters Christian Scott and Wallace Roney.

As to influences, Tixier says, “There are many: Ravel, Debussy, Haydn. I love Bach, Mozart. A lot of today’s music evolved from them. Herbie Hancock was the first guy I listened to except classical. I transcribed all his solos. Then we opened for him in 2012.”

Tixier cites others, including Kenny Clark, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Paul Bley, Keith Jarrett, Art Tatum, and Chick Correa.

For the “Jazz Upstairs” concert, Tixier will be joined by Joshua Crumbly, bass, and Jonathan Pinson, drums.

Pinson started on piano and moved to drums at the Colburn School of the Performing Arts. He studied with Billy Higgins and received a BA in Music from Berklee College of Music and an MA from the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance at UCLA.

Pinson has performed with Ambrose Akinmusire, John Clayton, Herbie Hancock, Dave Liebman, Wayne Shorter, Ed Simon, and Eric Reed. He’s played at numerous jazz festivals and is an active performer in New York and Los Angeles.

Crumbly began playing the electric bass at age nine and later moved on to the upright bass under the tutelage of Al Mckibbon. While studying at the Julliard School, Crumbly was tapped to play bass with the Terence Blanchard Quintet, a position he held for five years.

He received a BA from Julliard and has performed with Kamasi Washington, Lizz Wright, Stefon Harris, Ravi Coltrane, and Anthony Wilson & The Curators. He’s working on his first solo album planned for a fall release.

Asked about his music, Tixier says, “It’s hard to define my own music. I like to bring people to someplace. I try to write some poetry with music, make it an aspect of who we are as humans. It’s a movie with many chapters, definitely improvised but also a lot of writing. It’s a cinematic, musical journey, a bit of who I am as best I can every time I play.”

Tickets: Miller Symphony Hall box office, 23 N. Sixth St., Allentown; allentownsymphony.org; 610-432-6715