Augustin Hadelich returns to the Houston Symphony Orchestra (HSO) for subscription concerts on March 26, 28 and 29, performing Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 2. Performances take place in the orchestra’s home, Jones Hall, and Gilbert Varga will conduct.

Houston audiences have waited nearly five years for Augustin’s return to the HSO, longer than anticipated. He was to have performed the Bartók for a return engagement in November 2012, but Hurricane Sandy forced him to cancel his travels from New York City. Augustin made his subscription debut with the Houston Symphony Orchestra in 2010, performing a double bill of Chausson’s Poème and Ravel’s Tzigane, a show-stopping display that “exerted the kind of exuberance that threatens to lift the listener right out of his seat,” according to the Houston Chronicle.

Augustin has become closely associated with the music of Bartók. He performed the last movement of the Sonata for Solo Violin in the semi-final round of the 2006 International Violin Competition of Indianapolis (IVCI), where he took the Gold Medal. He recorded the Solo Sonata for his debut on AVIE Records, Flying Solo, noted by Gramophone for his “constant expressive variation of tone colour and emphasis … the sonata's Hungarian character comes out particularly strongly, due to Hadelich's idiomatic rhythmic sense.” The magazine concluded, “Outstanding musicianship separates Augustin Hadelich from the pack.” Augustin has recorded Bartók’s Second Violin Concerto alongside the Mendelssohn, with Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, due for release on AVIE in 2015.

Augustin has performed with virtually all of the major symphony orchestras in North America including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles and New York Philharmonics, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco and Toronto Symphonies. This season he makes his debuts with the Minnesota Orchestra and, in the UK, the London Philharmonic Orchestra. In addition to his Gold Medal at the IVCI, Augustin has been awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant (2009), a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship (2010), and the 2012 Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, for which he was nominated by the New York Philharmonic and Music Director Alan Gilbert.

Born in Italy to German parents, Augustin Hadelich holds an artist diploma from The Juilliard School, where he was a student of Joel Smirnoff. He plays on the 1723 “Ex-Kiesewetter” Stradivari violin, on loan from Clement and Karen Arrison through the generous efforts of the Stradivari Society.

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For further information, image or interview requests please contact Melanne Mueller, MusicCo International, +1 917 907 2785 or +44 (0) 20 8698 6933, melanne@musiccointernational.com 

For further information about Augustin Hadelich, please visit www.augustin-hadelich.com

CONCERT INFORMATION
Thursday, March 26, 2015 – 8:00 pm
Saturday, March 28, 2015 – 8:00 pm
Sunday, March 28, 2015 – 2:30 pm
Jones Hall – Houston, TX

Augustin Hadelich violin
Houston Symphony Orchestra
Gilbert Varga conductor

Bartók Violin Concerto No. 2
Also on the program:
Mendelssohn Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Mozart Symphony No. 39

http://www.houstonsymphony.org