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The tour with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra ended last night in New York’s Carnegie Hall. At one point two days ago, I couldn’t remember where we had started our day (it was in fact Atlanta—an early morning departure from there; flight to Newark; bus to Pennsylvania with a lunch-stop on the way; concert there; ride back to New York City and checking into the hotel at 11 p.m.). It was all a fabulous experience, and to finish it with my debut in the “big” Carnegie Hall (having played three times now in Zankel Hall underneath it) was thrilling beyond words. It took me (and concert promoters…) 25 years from when I won my big prize in Toronto to reach that stage. It was worth the wait. Not only to perform there with all those years of experience behind me and to feel so secure when I walked out to perform my Bach Concerto, but to still have such an important “first” at this point in my career. There is still so much to do and look forward to! The hall was full which was wonderful to see. New York City was miraculously spared the big snowstorm which paralyzed so much of the east coast yesterday. The concert also went out live on WNYC, and it was great to play a Fazioli in that beautiful hall. I sat out for the second half of the concert, joining a very large group of friends who had come from my hometown in Canada, from California, Israel, and elsewhere. Thank you Orpheus for giving me that marvellous opportunity which I will always remember!

My upcoming recital in Roy Thomson Hall, Toronto (February 12th) is the 25th anniversary celebration of my win in the Toronto International Bach Piano Competition. I remember it as though it were yesterday. For the occasion, I have written a very short memoir of that night when the prize was announced. To read it please go to:

http://soundboard.roythomson.com/index.php/2010/02/03/angela-hewitt-in-her-own-words/

If you are in the Toronto area and don't yet have your tickets, then get them now and join us for this very special occasion!

Free days are sometimes the busiest. On a concert day it's easy to refuse lunches, dinners, meetings, sometimes interviews although not always. But on a "free" day you pile everything else in. So it was in New York the past two days.Hair appointment; lunch with agent; hours of practise; endless mails to answer. Then on Tuesday night, I was invited to perform with the wind players of Orpheus at a sponsor's evening in a fantastic loft in Soho. We played the Mozart Piano and Wind Quintet--and indeed played it on only one short rehearsal beforehand. We had no troubles at all as we knew the piece so well. What a joy, and especially to play it with musicians of that calibre! As an encore I did a Chopin Nocturne. And who was sitting in the first row? Sir Peter Maxwell Davies! He will be attending our concerts tomorrow in Pennsylvania and Saturday night at Carnegie Hall to hear his new piece. He forgave me immediately for not playing it myself which was a relief. But I really must ask him to write me something else as we had such fun talking there, and then afterwards over dinner with his partner Colin Parkinson (to his left in the photo of us all). And then yesterday here in Atlanta I gave another private evening for the Friends of Spivey Hall, a group of whom are coming to my festival in Italy this summer! I'm so thrilled they are taking the initiave and also bringing along the artistic director of the hall, Sam Dixon. But now I must get ready for the concert tonight here at Emory University.

About 250 people rather than 1000 braved the few inches of snow (laughable to a Canadian) and came to hear us perform in Durham NC last night. I felt sorry for the promoter who had expected a full house, but what can one do? All we could do was to play our best. The bad news came at intermission: our flight to Newark for the next morning was cancelled. The only alternative was to leave the hotel at 4 a.m. and take the bus to Greensboro (going southbound to go north...), then a flight to Charlotte, then another flight to Newark, then another bus to Purchase. I woke up at 2:15 a.m. and that was it. Instead of trying to sleep another half hour I washed my hair so as not to look a total fright. The orchestra was very stoic about it all--a few groans but nothing much more (I'm told that's because there were no wind players with us, other than the lovely flautist, Liz Mann, seen with me at the end of it all in the photo). Musicians are a tough breed. We did have a laugh at Greensboro airport when the agent at the gate announced priority boarding "for those with small children and large instruments" (2 of the 3 cellists are man and wife and they had their 5-year-old son with them)! I've learned to nap a bit on planes which helped. Still, we only got to the hall an hour and a half before the concert, just in time to eat the food they had generously prepared for us and get dressed. The audience of course wouldn't have had a clue about all of that. Just as well. And again we played with all our energy. What is it about music that brings out this tremendous force when all you feel like is collapsing?

Here we are on the highway between the states of Virginia and North Carolina, travelling all together (soloists, orchestra, management) in a coach in a snowstorm (the photo was just taken at a rest stop--I'm with the orchestra's manager, Graham Parker). We had to leave Richmond much earlier than planned because we were afraid that if we waited it would get worse. The driver is excellent at least, and we are heavily laden down with cellos and baggage and so have good traction. Whether or not anyone will turn up for the concert tonight is another matter! We are happy having wi-fi internet on the bus, and lots of cookies (even gluten-free) and snacks that they bought for us before leaving! Last night they certainly turned out in Richmond and gave us a very warm welcome. I had forgotten that I had played there in recital at least 5 years ago, but remembered as soon as we drove up to the hall. It's a great pleasure to work with Orpheus--the most democratic of chamber orchestras. Each player has their say. They take turns listening in the hall during rehearsals. I mustn't conduct with my hands--oh no! Christopher Taylor was the brave pianist who took on the piece by Maxwell Davies which they premiered. The composer himself hasn't turned up yet, and they did an amazing job playing it without conductor. The part that I gave up on they evidently played at half speed (that's what I thought would happen). Even then it sounded extremely fast. But bravo to all! I was happy playing my Bach which is my world.

Last night at London’s Barbican Hall was a concert I will always remember. A very large crowd listened wonderfully to a substantial concert with the BBC Symphony directed by the gifted young (23-year-old) French conductor Lionel Bringuier (assistant at the Los Angeles Philharmonic). After the opening work by Dutilleux, we did something which probably had never been done before: a version of Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin in which we kept the same order as the original piano version, but the 4 movements that Ravel orchestrated were played by them, and I played the other 2 (Fugue and Toccata). In between all that, if you can imagine, I also played two solo pieces of Couperin (Le Tic-Toc-Choc and Les Baricades Mystérieuses). It was the idea of Paul Hughes, the orchestra’s manager. The hardest thing for me was sitting there all that time and not playing the music I knew so well, but rather trying to keep my hands warm (I bought some hand-warmers over the internet that normally are used for camping or trekking in the wilderness on a cold day, rather than on stage in the Barbican, but they helped a lot!). It was certainly different, and everyone enjoyed it. After intermission I performed one of my top favourites of all time: Ravel’s Concerto in G major. I learned it when I was 15 years old, and adore its jazzy rhythms and the poignancy of the slow movement. It is a piece of perfection in all respects. The orchestra played their difficult part brilliantly. If you want, you can hear it on BBC Radio 3 tomorrow night (Monday). Details on: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00q906t

Earlier in the week I gave two chamber music concerts which were also hugely satisfying: playing Brahms and Schumann with German violinist Isabelle Faust (our first collaboration but hopefully not our last) and horn player Stephen Stirling (see photo). Working this past month on the Brahms Horn Trio had given me nothing but aches (all that jumping around in the last movement!) but it was worth it, and both performances, in Reading Town Hall (a great venue!) and Wigmore Hall were exhilarating. When you have a new collaboration like that, you have to come so well prepared and then also be prepared to change everything at the last minute (Isabelle and I met for the first time the day before--that was all our schedules permitted, but that is not unusual). But our approaches meshed together well.

Returning home last night after the post-concert party I realized I had locked myself out of my own house. So instead of sleeping outside the pub next door, I had to wake up my 86-year-old neighbour at 12:30 a.m. and get the spare keys! Oh dear! Stupid girl.

Reading about the disaster in Haiti makes everything else seem trivial; but life for the rest of us goes on. Another tour of Italy is over with. A mini-tour at least: 5 concerts in 7 days. Four in the north; one in the south. Different worlds for sure. Last night I played in Bari for the Camerata Barese, a concert association which is 67 years old. Their normal theatre was not available, so my concert was in the Sheraton Hotel where I was also staying. Never have I been in my pyjamas so quickly after giving a concert—an elevator ride and that was it! The public was numerous and very appreciative, even if some ladies near the front insisted on talking through a lot of it (what could they have possibly been saying—it would have been nice to know! Perhaps they were discussing my shoes). The collective sigh emitted by the audience when I began the Chopin Nocturne as my second encore was exactly what I expected. Whereas in other countries one would for sure hear some murmurs, in Italy it’s most likely to be everybody saying “Bello!” all at once. But I like that. I’m not complaining! My stay in Bari was made very pleasant by a friend of a friend who gave me her studio at the Conservatorio to practise in and couldn’t have been nicer (photo taken on a street corner near there); and also by the waiter in the restaurant (who had spent many years in Toronto) who not only served up my gluten-free pasta, but also told me how to make their speciality: pasta with broccoli rabe and anchovies. The secret is to cook the pasta in the same water as the broccoli. Must try it now when I get home. I also bought some new luggage—4 wheels instead of 2 which hopefully will be easier on my arms. I was sad to say goodbye to my old cases in the hotel room—leaving behind old friends who had travelled the world with me. Trieste before that was great as always—one of my favourite places to play in Italy, and I had a new Fazioli from the factory nearby to try out the Brahms F minor Sonata for the first time in several years (what a piece!). The concerts with the Orchestra da Camera di Mantova were a joy, and I can’t wait to work with them again at my festival this summer. In Vicenza, besides doing an open rehearsal for school children, I also played a small solo recital in the Villa Valmarana for the 100th anniversary of the concert society. That is where all those lovely photos for BBC Music Magazine were taken exactly a year ago. Now it’s back to London and two more very difficult programmes in the next week.

When musicians correspond or talk with each other, it seems to me that the main subject of conversation (if it isn’t conductors!) is the latest travel horror story. 2010 started for me with one of those. Yesterday I had to go from my home in Umbria up to Mantova—a journey that might have taken 4 or maximum 5 hours (with a stop at a service station) by car but that instead took me 7 by train. The first one was an hour late, and then, when I got on, the seat I had reserved didn’t exist. So I took the last seat in first class, but of course at the next station I got thrown out by someone else who had it booked. Then all the passengers in the car got talking (as happens in Italian trains!) and I found out that the train was an hour late leaving Salerno where it started because Trenitalia decided they didn’t have enough seats in 2nd class, so they simply converted one of the first class carriages (mine!) into second class and there were people standing in the aisles and sitting on the floor. So I just left my suitcases in the aisle where they were (couldn’t move them anyway) and found a seat elsewhere. Four hours later when we got to Modena, I had of course missed my connection and so settled in the freezing cold waiting room for the hour wait. After about 15 minutes I suddenly realized they were announcing a departure to Verona, and I knew that was the line to Mantova, although I hadn’t seen that train listed. So I ran like a bat out of hell to the elevator at the end of the platform (no way I could manage the stairs with a suitcase that must way over 25 kilos), and made it down, across, and up just in time to get on before the doors closed. In Italy you have to be alert because nothing is played by the book. Although the snow here isn’t like it seems to be in most of Europe at the moment, there was still some and I realized that the first thing I have to do tomorrow is buy new boots or else I will die of pneumonia (the old ones have holes). Today, however, was a joy, working once more with the Orchestra da Camera di Mantova. They were at my festival last year, and will come again this summer. So many things that one usually has to say in rehearsal simply don’t have to be even mentioned. Their leader, Carlo Fabiano (see photo) is a first-class musician and hand picks all the players himself. Together with violinist Giovanni Angeleri from Padova, we will perform Double Concertos by Haydn and Mendelssohn, and I will do the Bach D minor Concerto alone with them. Our venue tomorrow is the fantastic Teatro Bibiena where Mozart played as a boy. The concert will be repeated in Vicenza on Friday.

A Happy New Year to all my readers!

The biggest Christmas tree in the world is in Gubbio, Umbria (so says the Guinness Book of Records). It is made up of neon lights and is 800 metres high and 400 metres wide. I've seen it and it's quite a sight. This photo was taken by the Operations Director of my festival, Guglielmo Beneduce, who lives there. It covers the mountainside of Monte Ingino where the city of Gubbio is famously laid out, going right to the top where the Basilica of Saint Ubaldo is situated (you can see the lights of buildings at the bottom and the top which gives you some idea of its size). It is topped by the star of Bethlehem (a very common decoration in Italy--I also have one on my house!).

If you have nothing else to do (unlikely) on Christmas Eve, you can listen to the recital I gave last summer in the Cheltenham Festival on BBC Radio 3's Lunchtime Concert at 1 p.m. GMT. For details see:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00pdkbh

May I wish you all a very Merry Christmas! Stay safe and warm wherever you are!