Hough, Stephen
*WORKS BY STEPHEN HOUGH CAN BE FOUND IN THE ‘MUSIC IN PRINT’ SECTION OF THIS WEBSITE*
With a singular artistic vision that transcends musical fashions and trends, Stephen Hough is widely regarded as one of the most important and distinctive pianists of his generation. In 2001, in recogntion of his achievements, he was awarded a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship, joining prominent scientists, writers and others who have made unique contributions to contemporary life.
Stephen Hough has appeared with most of the major European and American orchestras and plays recitals regularly in the major halls, concert series and festivals around the world, including over 20 concerto appearances at the BBC Proms. Recent engagements include performances with the New York and London Philharmonics, the London and San Francisco Symphonies, a US tour with the Russian National Orchestra led by Vladimir Jurowski,and a worldwide televised performance with the Berlin Philharmonic under Sir Simon Rattle.
In 2009 Hough became the first British instrumetalist to give a solo recital on the main stage of Carnegie Hall in nearly 20 years. He also peformed all of the works for piano and orchestra of Tchaikovsky over four BBC Proms and returned to the Chicago Symphony in 2010/11 to play the same Tchaikovsky cycle over six concerts.
An exclusive Hyperion recording artist, Hough’s catalogue of over 50 CDs has garnered many international prizes, including the Deutsche Schallplattenpreis, Diapason d’or, Monde de la musique, several Grammy nominations, and eight Gramophone Magazine Awards, including ‘Record of the Year’ (1996 and 2003), and the Gramophone ‘Gold Disc’ Award (2008), which named his complete Saint-Saëns Piano Concertos as the best recording of the past 30 years. His 2005 live recording of the Rachmaninoff Piano Concertos became the fastest selling recording in Hyperion’s history, while his 1987 recording of Hummel concertos is Chandos’ best-selling disc to date.
Stephen Hough is also an avid writer and composer. In addition to scholarly and critically-acclaimed CD liner notes and articles for music publications, he has written for The Guardian, The Times, and in 2008 was invited by the Telegraph Media Group to start a cultural blog. Hough has written extensively about theology for the print media and his book, The Bible as Prayer, was published by Continuum and Paulist Press in 2007.
In the same year Hough’s cello concerto The Loneliest Wilderness was
premiered by Steven Isserlis and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and two choral works - Mass of Innocence and Experience and Missa Mirabilis - were performed at London’s Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral respectively. In 2009 Hough’s trio, Was mit den Tränen Geschieht, commissioned by members of the Berlin Philharmonic, received its world premiere at the Berlin Philharmonie, and a string sextet, Requiem Aeternum: after Victoria, was commissioned by the National Gallery for its major summer exhibition, The Sacred Made Real: Spanish Painting and Sculpture 1600-1700.
In 2010, after giving the world premiere of his cycle Herbstlieder at the Oxford Lieder Festival, The Prince Consort commissioned Hough to write a companion song cycle to the two Brahms Liebeslieder Walzer sets, and the resulting work was Other Love Songs. Hough also received a joint commission from Wigmore Hall, Le Musée de Louvre and Musica Viva Australia for the Sonata for Piano (broken branches), which will form the centerpiece of an album of his own works - Broken Branches: music by Stephen Hough - scheduled for release in November 2011 on BIS Records. In 2012 the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra will perform a newly-commissioned version of Hough’s Missa Mirabilis for choir and orchestra.
A resident of London, Stephen Hough is a visiting professor at the Royal Academy of Music in London and holds the International Chair of Piano Studies at his alma mater, the Royal Northern College in Manchester.