Augustin Hadelich

Early life and education

Augustin Hadelich was born in Cecina, Italy, to German parents. His two older brothers were already playing cello and piano when Augustin (age 5) began his studies on the violin with his father, an agriculturalist and amateur cellist. In his early musical development, Hadelich progressed in his studies through irregular lessons and masterclasses from violinists traveling near the Hadelich farm in rural Tuscany, including Uto Ughi, Christoph Poppen, Igor Ozim, and Norbert Brainin. Hadelich enjoyed a blossoming career as a wunderkind violinist, pianist, and composer in Germany as a contemporary of violinist Julia Fischer.

In 1999, Augustin Hadelich suffered severe burns at a fire on his family's farm in Italy and he was airlifted to be treated in Germany. The accident left Hadelich unable to play for over a year. "It is perhaps because of this experience — because I had this moment where I wasn’t sure if I would ever play the violin again — that I appreciate what is happening in my life more. I really try to enjoy every moment. It made me realize how important music was to me," Hadelich has commented. After his recovery, Hadelich graduated summa cum laude from the Instituto Mascagni in Livorno, Italy, and successfully auditioned for admission to The Juilliard School. From 2004-2007, Hadelich studied at Juilliard with Joel Smirnoff, graduating with a Graduate Diploma (2005) and an Artist Diploma (2007).

Career

Shortly after winning first prize at the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis in 2006, Augustin Hadelich proved himself ready for the world stage through several short-notice substitutions with major orchestras. In 2008 he filled in for Julian Rachlin at the Hollywood Bowl, performing with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. In 2010, Hadelich made his New York Philharmonic debut at the Bravo! Vail Festival substituting for violinist Nikolaj Znaider. He has since appeared as a soloist with every major orchestra in North America, many of them multiple times, including Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and San Francisco Symphony. Among his recent and upcoming worldwide appearances are the BBC Philharmonic, Danish National Symphony, Finnish Radio Orchestra, Hamburg Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Munich Philharmonic, Netherlands Philharmonic, Norwegian Radio Orchestra, NHK Symphony Tokyo, as well as the radio orchestras of Cologne, Frankfurt, and Stuttgart.

Hadelich is known to perform a wide range of repertoire. Although he is often scheduled to perform from the standard violin concerto repertoire (Beethoven, Brahms, Sibelius, Tchaikovsky, etc), he is also a champion of contemporary works, such as the violin concertos by Thomas Adès, Henri Dutilleux and György Ligeti, and recital works by Brett Dean, David Lang, György Kurtag, Toru Takemitsu and Bernd Alois Zimmermann.

Awards and accolades

In February 2016, Augustin Hadelich won his first Grammy Award for the Best Classical Instrumental Solo category at the 58th Grammy Awards in Los Angeles for his performance of Henri Dutilleux’s Violin Concerto, ‘L’Arbre Des Songes’ with the Seattle Symphony and music director Ludovic Morlot on the Seattle Symphony Media label.

In October 2015, Hadelich became the inaugural winner of the Warner Music Prize, which includes a grant of $100,000 and a recording opportunity with Warner Classics.

Hadelich won the gold medal at the 2006 International Violin Competition of Indianapolis, where he also received several additional accolades, including best performance of a Romantic concerto, Classical concerto, Beethoven sonata, violin sonata other than Beethoven, Bach work, commissioned work, encore piece and Paganini caprice.

He has also received an Avery Fisher Career Grant (2009), a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship (2011) and Lincoln Center’s Martin E. Segal Award (2012).

Discography

Augustin Hadelich has recorded two CDs for Naxos, an album of Haydn's violin concertos with the Cologne Chamber Orchestra, where Hadelich composed his own cadenzas, and Telemann’s complete fantasies for solo violin.

For the AVIE label, he has recorded five CDs: Flying Solo, from October 2009, features solo violin works by Bartók, Paganini, Ysaÿe and Bernd Alois Zimmermann. Echoes of Paris, released in February 2011, features works for violin and piano by Debussy, Poulenc, Prokofiev and Stravinsky. Histoire du Tango features works for violin and guitar with the spanish guitarist Pablo Sáinz Villegas by De Falla, Paganini, Piazzolla and Sarasate, was released in March 2013. "Sibelius - Ades Violin Concertos" features the violin concertos of Sibelius and Thomas Adès with Hannu Lintu and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra was released in June 2014 and nominated for a Gramophone award. In July 2015, Hadelich released a recording pairing the Mendelssohn violin concerto and Bartók's second violin concerto with Miguel Harth-Bedoya and the Norwegian Radio Orchestra.

For his 2015 recording of Henri Dutilleux’s Violin Concerto ('L'Arbre Des Songes') with the Seattle Symphony and Ludovic Morlot, Hadelich was awarded the 2016 Grammy for Best Classical Instrumental Solo.

Instrument

Hadelich currently performs with the 1723 Kiesewetter Stradivarius violin, on loan from Clement and Karen Arrison through the Stradivari Society of Chicago.

From October 2006 until August 2010, Hadelich performed with the 1683 "ex-Gingold" Stradivari as the standing first-prize winner of the Indianapolis Competition.