HSO Soloist Augustin Hadelich Wins a Grammy Award

Move over, Kanye West.

Augustin Hadelich

There are Grammy Awards for Classical Music, too, and a violinist who has appeared as a soloist with the HSO on three separate occasions has won the 2016 Grammy for "Best Classical Instrumental Solo" [sic] in his recording of Henri Dutilleux's violin concerto, L'Arbre des songes or "The Tree of Dreams," with Ludovic Morlot conducting the Seattle Symphony on their own media label distributed by Naxos.

Congratulations, Augustin Hadelich!

He appeared here most recently last February - remember the snowstorm that weekend? - when he played Eduard Lalo's Symphonie espagnole. You may have been one of the many people who missed that concert.

In previous appearances in Harrisburg, he played the Beethoven Violin Concerto in January, 2010 and before that, Mozart's 5th Violin Concerto, the one known as "The Turkish."



He has previously recorded the Sibelius Violin Concerto which he paired with a more recent concerto by the English composer, Thomas Adès, subtitled Concentric Paths, which created a good deal of buzz when it was released. Hannu Lintu conducted the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic on this Avie recording. You can hear the gorgeous opening movement of the Adès here; the striking slow movement, a chaconne, here; and the dance-like finale, here.

Both the Adès and this Grammy-winning recording of the Dutilleux, both favorites of mine, are the best performances of the work I've heard (and I have three other recordings of the Dutilleux). So I highly recommend listening to these.









It is available for purchase on-line through Amazon, here. or through the Naxos Direct website, here.

The award is especially fitting in this year celebrating the Centennial Anniversary of the birth of French composer Henri Dutilleux. 

So, our congratulations to Augustin Hadelich on winning his first Grammy! And we look forward to hearing him again, soon, and to more Grammys in the future!

- Dick Strawser