When Guitar Trek plays at the Canberra Symphony Orchestra's Prom Picnic concert on Saturday, February 18, it will be a celebration of 30 years of music by the group. Canberra's Timothy Kain established the group in 1987 as a tribute to master guitarist Andres Segovia and with the aim of generating new music, of enthusing young audiences and of letting listeners hear the range of music that can be produced from Guitar Trek's collection of Australian guitars. "These guitars all produce a very full, rich, colourful sound," Kain says. "Three were made by Australian luthier Greg Smallman, who revolutionised the construction of contemporary classical guitars worldwide, and one by very fine Perth maker, Greg Sheridan."

The three other current members of Guitar Trek, Minh Le Hoang, Bradley Kunda and Matt Withers, all studied with Kain at the ANU School of Music and were selected by him to join the ensemble but all four guitarists have also flourished as soloists in Australia and overseas. Withers and Kunda also perform together as the Brew Guitar Duo.

Withers says: "The Prom will be a great birthday celebration on home turf and it's also Tim's own birthday this January."

He says the group's success began with the first concert with the original group 30 years ago.

"The audience loved the concert so much that the entire program had to be played again 15 minutes after the concert finished."

Graham Abbott, well known for his ABC music programs, will conduct the Prom concert.

"I've never conducted Guitar Trek before," Abbott says, "and we're all looking forward to meeting in person for the first time. It'll be great for them to get a chance to play on their own as well as with the orchestra."

Withers says: "We'll be performing pieces from our last couple of CDs, Serene Nights released in 2015 and Six Fish, and the music of Nigel Westlake, which is an exciting mix for the instruments. We like to use combinations of different guitars."

Kain describes Six Fish as "highly imaginative. It uses a combination of two standard classical guitars, a 12-string guitar and a Dobro guitar to conjure the shimmering underwater world complete with sunfish, leafy sea dragons and flying fish."

A real feature of the concert will be Joaquin Rodrigo's Concierto Andaluz for four guitars and orchestra. Unlike his best known work, Concierto de Aranjuez and his popular Fantasia para un gentilhombre, this work is not often played.

"That's because it's very hard to get four guitarists who really fit together," Abbott says, "so working with Guitar Trek and the orchestra will be absolutely ideal. It's a wonderful piece – so bright and happy. I've only ever heard it on recordings and never conducted it before but it will be great fun to do."

Abbott says that Nicholas Milton, CSO's chief conductor and artistic director, has chosen a good program for the rest of the concert.

"I was a bit shocked when I first saw it," Abbott says, "because there are five opera overtures ... but when I look at the way that he's constructed the program it makes perfect sense. They're really well known overtures, including The Barber of Seville and William Tell, that contain fabulous tunes – really good showpieces for the orchestra. The way that Nick's slotted the Guitar Trek pieces in between these overtures and the other operatic excerpts has made a lovely program – a perfect program for this sort of outdoor setting.

"The William Tell Overture is so pictorial," Abbott goes on, "and I suppose that people of my generation always think of Bugs Bunny shaving Elmer Fudd's head to the accompaniment of The Barber of Seville Overture in the old cartoon. It's all very bright and in your face stuff."

The audience will have its fill of opera pieces but all in purely instrumental form. There will be no singing, except perhaps from a few gregarious gate-crashing birds. The program also includes the Dance of the Hours from Ponchielli's La Gioconda, and the Intermezzo from Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana. The only non-operatic piece is the little Minuet from Boccherini's string quartet.

Guitar Trek will also perform their take on the famous Pachelbel Canon. "It's called The Loose Canon," Withers explains. "It's an arrangement by the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet – a mixture of rumba, jazz and metal." It will be the penultimate piece before the brio of William Tell.

"The end of the concert is going to be a real hoot, I think," Abbott says.