The Steinway Society of Central Florida will hold its annual Divas Gala on Sunday, August 9, at the Orlando Museum of Art, turning the society’s biggest fundraiser into a retirement celebration for co-founder Gary Grimes.
The gala runs from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m. and is built around three dueling pianists: Carol J. Stein, Julian Bond and Michael Mastroianni. For readers watching the event now, that is the reason the gala is drawing attention today: it has a fixed date, a fixed place and a farewell attached to it.
The 2026 theme, “Diva and Dudes Shenanikeys Gala,” gives the night a playful edge while keeping the format that has made it the society’s largest annual event. The performers are expected to move through Broadway, jazz, movies, rock and Disney showtunes, a mix that gives the fundraiser its broad appeal and its name recognition inside Central Florida.
Grimes’ retirement is the emotional center of the evening. He announced he is leaving the piano industry after about 70 years, yet he will remain president of the Steinway Society. That detail makes the celebration less like a clean ending than a handoff, with the founder stepping back from the business he helped build while still holding the title that ties him to it.
Carol Stein, who was born in Miami, Florida and began piano studies at age four, heads the Carol Stein & Friends Jazz Band. Bond has worked internationally as a composer, pianist, conductor and producer, and in 2004 Turner Classic Movies named him one of the USA’s top 10 young film score composers. Mastroianni is a Berklee College of Music graduate whose work for the Walt Disney Company has included Broadway Concert Series, Candlelight Processional, Cool Kid Summer and Jollywood Nights, the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue, the River Roost Lounge at Port Orleans Riverside hotel and EPCOT venues.
The unanswered question is not whether the gala matters. It already does, as the society’s biggest fundraiser. The question is how the organization will balance a retirement tribute, a high-energy piano showcase and the leadership shift that keeps Grimes in place as president even after he leaves the industry. For attendees on August 9, the night will be both a celebration and a marker of what comes next for the Steinway Society of Central Florida.
