Nicolas Hodges releases Dusapin’s Piano Concerto: À quia, on BIS prior to the UK premiere in Glasgow of Steen-Andersen’s spectacular Piano Concerto 30 November, CD release BIS 2262 Pascal Dusapin À quia Pascal Dusapin Wenn du dem Wind Pascal Dusapin Aufgang Nicolas Hodges piano Carolin Widmann violin Natascha Petrinsky mezzo-soprano Pascal Rophé conductor Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire “a ‘portrait disc’ par excellence’ Richard Whitehouse in Gramophone, 2013, on Dusapin: Orchestral Works, featuring Nicolas Hodges On 30 November, BIS releases a disc of music by Pascal Dusapin, including his ‘À quia’ piano concerto, performed by contemporary pianist Nicolas Hodges. Hodges returns regularly to the UK over the coming season, giving the UK premiere of Simon Steen-Andersen’s Piano Concerto – a multimedia spectacle featuring a video doppelgänger and prepared piano – in Glasgow on 12 January, and performing Ligeti’s Piano Concerto in the Barbican on 2 March as part of a Total Immersion day on the composer. Hodges has long encouraged the creation of new contemporary repertoire for the piano. He has an inexhaustible energy to communicate new music, and has commissioned over 25 piano concertos to date. He has premiered works by Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Thomas Adès, and Elliott Carter, lately premiering Gerald Barry’s 2014 Piano Concerto in Birmingham. In August 2020, he will premiere a new concerto by Rebecca Saunders. Pascal Dusapin’s À quia explores states of speechlessness, and the feeling of not knowing quite how to respond. The title comes from the French expression ‘quia quia quia’, used when academics were caught out and could think of nothing better to say. The autograph score is also marked by the dates of significant events that occurred during the work’s composition, such as 3 July, 2001, the date of the indictment of war criminal Milosevic, as did 9/11. À quia does not contemplate the events directly but more the feeling of being struck dumb at the news. Nicolas Hodges notes: “The concerto is really a masterpiece. It is so full of colour and expression, and entirely individual.” Hodges first met Dusapin in the early 2000s, after years of mutual admiration for each other’s work. He has since become the composer’s preferred interpreter for piano music and has premiered several of Dusapin’s works, including the piano concertino Jetzt Genau (2013) and Slackline, which was first performed at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires in collaboration with cellist Anssi Karttunen. “He plays the classics as if they were written yesterday, and what was written yesterday as if it were already a classic.” – Tempo Magazine The French composer Pascal Dusapin only began writing for the piano in earnest in 1998, having previously dismissed the instrument’s static timbre and uniform percussiveness. Influenced by Edgard Varèse and studying under Iannis Xenakis, the composer rejects the use of electronics in favour of a ‘romantic restraint’, but incorporates microtones into his writing, and rejects traditional European forms. His influences range from jazz to French folksong. The concerto is performed here with the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire and conductor Pascal Rophé. Also included on the disc is a violin concerto, Aufgang with Carolin Widmann, and a suite for mezzo- soprano and orchestra, Wenn du dem Wind..., based on the composer’s opera Penthesilea, with soloist Natascha Petrinsky. Forthcoming appearances Hodges, now resident in Germany, will be returning frequently to the UK over the coming season to perform piano concertos by Simon Steen- Andersen and György Ligeti, alongside performances across Europe, including Beat Furrer’s Piano Concerto in Germany. On 12 January, Hodges will deliver the UK premiere of Steen- Andersen’s Piano Concerto with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra at Glasgow City Halls, conducted by Thomas Dausgaard. Premiered by Hodges in 2014, the concerto is a multimedia spectacle in which the pianist performs with a video doppelgänger, playing a severely damaged piano, dropped onto a concrete floor from a height of eight metres. The juxtaposition of perfect and damaged means the listener sees both instruments in a new light. On 2 March, Hodges returns to the Barbican to present Ligeti’s Piano Concerto alongside the BBC Symphony Orchestra and conductor Sakari Oramo. This performance is the culmination of the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s Total Immersion Day on Ligeti. Hodges performs Beat Furrer’s Piano Concerto in Munich’s Hercules Hall on 8 March, with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Peter Rundel. Recorded by Hodges and Rundel alongside the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln in 2007, the Piano Concerto is a composed investigation and analysis into the piano’s sound through various phenomena, resonances, overtone spectra and pedalisations. “The piano sound always remains the center of gravitation, while the orchestra is the amplifier giving space to the piano.” - Beat Furrer Rebecca Saunders Piano ConcertoWORLD PREMIERE On 29 August 2020, Hodges will inaugurate the world premiere performance of Rebecca Saunders’ Piano Concerto at the Lucerne Festival. Roche, in collaboration with the Lucerne Festival and the Lucerne Festival Academy, has awarded Rebecca Saunders their prestigious Roche Commission to enable her to compose a piano concerto for Hodges. The biannual Roche Commissions have previously been awarded to several high-profile composers, including Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Sir George Benjamin. Rather than commissioning works that will cater to mainstream fashions, Roche Commissions enables musical works to venture beyond the conventional and provide intellectual stimulation. Saunders will interact with leading scientists over the following two years and in 2020 the newly-developed commission will be premiered at the Lucerne Summer Festival. Berlin-based composer Rebecca Saunders is one of the UK’s most radical and distinguished composers, noted for her distinctive and intensely striking sonic language. Saunders’ compositions have been performed from Darmstadt to the Proms, and she adds the Roche Commission to an ever-growing number of accomplishments: she is a three-time recipient of the RPS Composers Award and has received the BASCA British Composers Award twice. In advance of the premiere, Hodges performs pieces by Saunders and by Wolfgang Rihm, the current artistic director of the Lucerne Festival Academy and Saunders’ teacher. On 15 December, Hodges will perform Rihm’s Zwei Linien alongside Pascal Dusapin’s 7 Etudes at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Paris, and will repeat the Rihm with Saunders’ Crimson in a radio broadcast on Radio France on 14 February. Upcoming highlights 18-19 Monday 3 December, 8:00pm Rebecca Saunders Crimson Reid Hall, Paris Luciano Berio Sequenza IV Yves Chauris New work WORLD Betsy Jolas Quatre pièces en PREMIERE marge; Postlude; Episode Wolfgang Rihm Zwei Linien Cinquième; B for Sonate; Mon Ami; Scion; Pièce pour; and Saturday 2 March, 7:30pm Femme le soir WORLD PREMIERE Barbican, London Saturday 15 December, György Ligeti Piano Concerto 5:00pm Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Augustin Hadelich violin Paris Nicolas Hodges piano Sakari Oramo conductor Wolfgang Rihm Zwei Linien BBC Singers ensemble Pascal Dusapin 7 Etudes BBC Symphony Orchestra Saturday 12 January, 8:00pm Friday 8 March Glasgow City Halls Hercules Hall, Munich Simon Steen-Andersen Piano Beat Furrer Piano Concerto Concerto UK PREMIERE Nicolas Hodges piano Nicolas Hodges piano Peter Rundel conductor Thomas Dausgaard conductor Bavarian Radio Symphony BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra Orchestra Saturday 29 August 2020 Saturday 27 January Lucerne Festival Basel Simon Steen-Andersen Piano Rebecca Saunders Piano Concerto Concerto WORLD PREMIERE Nicolas Hodges piano Nicolas Hodges piano Baldur Bronnimann conductor Matthias Pintscher conductor Basel Sinfonietta Orchestra of the Lucerne Festival Academy Thursday 14 February, 6:00pm Radio France Nicolas Hodges Contemporary pianist An active and ever-growing repertoire that encompasses such composers as Beethoven, Berg, Brahms, Debussy, Schubert and Stravinsky reinforces pianist Nicolas Hodges’ superior prowess in contemporary music. Born in London and now based in Germany, where he is a professor at the Musikhochschule Stuttgart, Hodges approaches the works of Classical, Romantic, 20th century and contemporary composers with the same questing spirit. Nicolas Hodges’ virtuosity and innate musicianship give him an assured command over the most strenuous technical complexities, making him a firm favourite among many of today’s most prestigious contemporary composers. Collaborating closely with figures such as John Adams and Helmut Lachenmann has become central to his career, and more than 25 of the world’s most revered composers have dedicated works to him, including Thomas Adès, Gerald Barry, Elliott Carter, James Clarke, Francisco Coll, Hugues Dufourt, Pascal Dusapin, Beat Furrer, Isabel Mundry, Brice Pauset, Wolfgang Rihm and Miroslav Srnka. Hodges enjoys a particularly close relationship with Sir Harrison Birtwistle, who recently described him as “becoming like my Peter Pears”. Recent highlights for Nicolas Hodges have included the premiere of Simon Steen-Andersen’s award-winning Piano Concerto, performed with Francois-Xavier Roth and the SWR Symphony Orchestra Freiburg Baden- Baden as part of the Donaueschingen Festival in 2014, as well as the world premiere of Variations from the Golden Mountains by Sir Harrison Birtwistle at London’s Wigmore Hall. Hodges