‘JUST LET THE MUSIC SPEAK’

The virtuoso violinist Augustin Hadelich defies categorisation; he is the product of several cultures that he draws on to produce a sound that is distinctly his own. He talks to Ariane Todes about his influences and how he developed his unique musicianship

I’s Thanksgiving Day when I talk to Augustin Hadelich over Zoom. He’s in a hotel room in Cleveland, Ohio, between rehearsals and performances of the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto with the Cleveland Orchestra, and it doesn’t look like he’ll get any turkey or trimmings. He doesn’t seem to mind, though. Born in Cecina, Italy, in 1984, to German parents, he took up US citizenship in 2014, and the celebration is not yet part of his psyche. ‘It’s a fun holiday because families get together,’ he says, ‘but it’s not something that I always did from an early age, like it is for Americans.’

Maybe it’s good that he hasn’t entirely absorbed his adopted culture yet. To my ears, Hadelich’s playing brings together the best qualities of both American and European playing: passion, polish and coherence, but also thoughtfulness, expressivity and nuance. He’s not having any of my oversimplification, though: ‘I’m not sure there is an American sound. You could say there’s a Russian sound – but actually, Russian players have such different sounds, so that, too, would be a generalisation.

I think the influences on my sound are Italian and German. The violinist I first liked was Uto Ughi [one of Hadelich’s earliest teachers]. He has a very lyrical, singing way of playing, and I always thought that was beautiful.

The German influence may be due to the fact that Schubert and Schumann songs were some of the earliest music I got to know. There’s a way of singing and letting the voice ring and be expressive that really resonates with me.’

He admits, however, that his sound did develop in the US: ‘What changed in America, when I came to study at Juilliard [with Joel Smirnoff], is that I figured out my bow technique. They were teaching that well – how to have a sensible, efficient right-hand technique that uses the weight of the bow. You learn how to play loudly without getting strident or aggressive. As a result, my sound did change, because I’m able to make it richer.’

A young Hadelich plays for Uto Ughi

Ughi and German Lieder might seem like outlying inspirations, but for Hadelich – living on a vineyard in Tuscany, the youngest of three musical children, learning violin with his amateur-cellist father – they were par for the course. His family didn’t even have a television or CD player when he started. He remembers, ‘As I was growing up, the only music in the house was what we played ourselves, which may be a good thing to some extent, but it was also a disadvantage not to hear professionals play. I was eight or nine when my parents finally said, “OK, let’s buy a CD player.” Then I started to listen a lot. As a result, I was heavily influenced by the people I could hear live, and that was mainly Uto Ughi.’

Perhaps this relative isolation explains why Hadelich has such a personal sound in an era when young violinists are often criticised for sounding alike – he had to figure things out for himself. ‘It made me listen very closely to myself, because I had a sense of when it didn’t sound good enough. Little by little you develop an idea of what you want to sound like. You start paying attention to all the little noises and imperfections between the notes and how to avoid those, and how to use the bow. Ultimately, this is probably what made my bow technique too fussy. At Juilliard, I had to simplify and become more efficient, but I think it was ingrained very deeply that I always looked for a sound.’

SUXIAO YANG. UGHI PHOTO COURTESY OF AUGUSTIN HADELICH

Hadelich performs a solo recital at the Konzerthaus Berlin in December 2023

BERLIN PHOTO SUXIAO YANG. INDIANAPOLIS PHOTO DENIS RYAN KELLY JR

‘MY BOW TECHNIQUE WAS TOO FUSSY. AT JUILLIARD, I HAD TO SIMPLIFY AND BECOME MORE EFFICIENT’

He was hardly living in a backwater, though: ‘Many classical musicians visit Tuscany, so in a funny way, it’s a great place to meet people, if you know where they are and when they’re going to be there.’ One of his great musical heroes was the Amadeus Quartet’s Norbert Brainin, who had a house nearby and taught in Fiesole. Hadelich had lessons with him as a twelve-year-old: ‘They were eye-opening, although I didn’t quite understand everything at the time. There were sometimes pieces he didn’t know well, but his approach was to look at the score or piano part to try to understand the whole thing. I hadn’t seen many teachers do that – they often just taught from the violin part.’ Brainin also cultivated a natural style of music making:

‘It made him very angry if you did something that was a cute effect, but artificial, which didn’t result from the music itself. It wasn’t about doing what the composer said literally; it was more that it needs to be a result of the music. There is a distinction. Some teachers might say, “OK, here it says crescendo so you have to make a crescendo.” It’s true that we should do what the composer says, but the other approach would be to ask, “Why is there a crescendo here?” and understand what’s going on underneath with the harmonies, which makes that crescendo necessary. I had just come from some lessons with Zakhar Bron, who would suggest things because they sounded good – a sudden effect or piano here or colour change there. It made Brainin quite upset. He would say, “Why are you doing this nonsense?” There was an understated simplicity in his approach. Just let the music speak.’

You can hear this philosophy in action in Hadelich’s performances, not least his Bach Sonatas and Partitas (2021), my favourite recording of the works of recent years – agile, detailed and expressive, but without the emphases, overphrasing and point-making that some players seem to regard as historical dues. I ask him where he draws the line when using urtext. He says: ‘It’s a sort of scavenger hunt for little details in the text. It’s really interesting and important, because sometimes you have choices to make. We have to know why something is different from how people used to play it, and to make informed decisions. That’s why the urtext is so important – to know what interpretative traditions were added later. With the old editions before urtext, you had no idea what was from the composer.’

There are limits, though: ‘It’s great that there is more close reading of sources nowadays, but it’s dangerous if that becomes a completely literal thing, with people saying, “This is now the source and this is exactly how you have to do this.” An important part of analysis is looking at how the piece was written, which ideas came first, how the composer filled them in – looking at the full score and analysing it harmonically and structurally. You realise that some composers aren’t so attentive about their dynamics. Brahms, for example, was incredibly thoughtful, so he often made sure there’s only one fortissimo and one pianissimo in a movement, so you know to show the peak and lowest points. But if it’s a composer who has fortissimos everywhere, like Mendelssohn or Dvořák, analysis of the piece and understanding of its structure will tell you more about the high and low points, which helps you interpret the markings.’

Although he was born in Europe, Hadelich’s career took off in North America first, following his first prize in the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis in 2006 and then an Avery Fisher Career Grant in 2009. It’s only in recent years that he’s finally conquered his home continent. And how! This spring his schedule covers Germany, Belgium, Spain, Austria and Finland.

Hadelich at the 2006 Indianapolis Competition

Hadelich plays Berg’s Violin Concerto with Andris Nelsons and the Vienna Philharmonic at the 2023 Salzburg Festival

SUXIAO YANG

‘SOME CONDUCTORS – IF THEY’VE PLAYED A LOT OF CHAMBER MUSIC – HAVE AN INTUITION ABOUT WHAT YOU’RE GOING TO DO NEXT. IT’S NOT AS SATISFYING WHEN CONDUCTORS JUST FOLLOW YOU’

He’s delighted by this development: ‘For many years I was mostly playing in North America, because my career started there. It is still my musical home, but I am very happy about playing more in Europe these days as well.’

His internet fame over lockdown must surely have contributed to breaking the European market finally. His videos became a regular highlight of those strange and isolating times as he shared his musical and technical insights with the utmost wisdom and fluency (just as he talks to me now). He was not the only violinist to do so, but he may have been the most consistent. He put out more than 50 ‘Ask Augustin’ sessions and has amassed more than 81,000 YouTube subscribers and 114,000 Instagram followers. Contemplate the statistics: 38,000 people have watched his ‘How to keep your left hand relaxed during fast passages’ video.

He is, however, sceptical about online presence being obligatory for a young player trying to build a career. ‘Social media becomes more important once you have success and a career, but I’m not sure that by itself it leads to success. If someone is famous on Instagram it doesn’t mean they’re going to get a lot of concerts. It’s more that some people who are Instagram-famous are playing lots of concerts and their Instagram following grows with that. You would be putting the cart before the horse to focus too much on social media to the detriment of other traditional aspects of career development, which still matter.’

What are these old-school ways? ‘The basic way a career develops healthily has to do with relationships with other musicians. People like playing with you and then they ask you to do more things with them. You play with a conductor who takes you somewhere else because he or she liked the collaboration. That’s how my career developed. The basic way a career develops hasn’t changed much. People need to want to hear you play, and to enjoy what you do and working with you.’

The list of leading conductors who want to collaborate with him is impressive. This spring they include Semyon Bychkov, Marin Alsop, Iván Fischer, Andris Nelsons and Jakub Hrůša. What has he learnt from the best? ‘When it works, it’s like chamber music. Some conductors – if they’ve played a lot of chamber music or if they’re experienced enough with soloists – have an intuition about what you’re going to do next, your phrasing. It’s not as satisfying when conductors just follow you. It can result in the orchestra being late to everything, and even when it’s together, it feels like everyone is just following the violinist. In some concertos that doesn’t work – when it’s more symphonic or like chamber music, like Brahms, Berg or even Tchaikovsky. A good interpretation is one where the violinist is actively listening all the time, reacting to the orchestra, and where the expression of the violin line is a result or reflection of what is happening underneath, resulting in changes of character and colour.’

The breadth of his repertoire as he tours is also remarkable, with concertos by Bach, Bartók, Brahms, Britten, Dvořák, Mozart, Prokofiev and Sibelius. There is a reason for this, he explains: ‘I enjoy every concert so much. An ideal career is one where I keep enjoying it this much and never get bored. This is why I don’t restrict myself to a few pieces each season.

Sometimes, it’s too many – this season it’s 18 concertos. I try to learn new things. If I had to play the Tchaikovsky Concerto 30 times in a row, at some point it would become routine. Even if it was pretty good, on some level people would sense that it’s not as intense for me any more, whereas if I play lots of other pieces and return to Tchaikovsky, it’s an exhilarating, intense experience. I think people can feel that, and I walk off stage excited, thinking it was an incredible experience for me, which I wouldn’t if I only played that piece all the time.’

When I ask him how he keeps all these pieces on the boil simultaneously, he goes back to his unconventional musical upbringing: ‘Growing up, there was a focus on learning lots of pieces rather than playing a piece perfectly. This ended up being one of my father’s good ideas, but at the time, everyone said it was a mistake. With other kids, the teacher would insist, “You’re going to play this piece for a year and perfect it,” whereas my father said, “You’ve been playing the Mendelssohn for a few weeks and it’s all right. Why don’t you try this and why don’t you try that?” And he kept putting music in front of me. By the time I was eleven, there may not have been a performance of which I would now say, “That was great,” but I was learning so much music. You don’t forget the music you learn as a child, so most of the concertos I have in my repertoire are works I memorised as a child. I still have to check my memory occasionally with these pieces, and prepare, but they are stored deep in my brain.’

HADELICH’S VIOLINS

MAIN PHOTO SUXIAO YANG. STRAD PHOTO COURTESY OF TARISIO

Since February 2020, Hadelich has been playing the c.1744 ‘Leduc, Szeryng’ Guarneri ‘del Gesù’ (right), on loan from the Tarisio Trust. ‘The sound of this violin has a richness and complexity that I have rarely heard in any instrument,’ he said in 2020. ‘Although I have often been more partial to the sound of Stradivari in the past, the moment I played the “Leduc”, something in the sound drew me to the violin and I did not want to stop playing.’

For the nine years prior to that, he played the 1723 ‘Kiesewetter’ Stradivari (see this issue’s cover), and from 2006–2010 he played the 1683 ‘ex-Gingold’ Stradivari, as the standing first-prize winner of the Indianapolis Competition.

‘MOST OF THE CONCERTOS I HAVE IN MY REPERTOIRE ARE WORKS I MEMORISED AS A CHILD. THEY ARE STORED DEEP IN MY BRAIN’

He also has a special trick: ‘I’ve become quite disciplined about making notes after performances, especially if I’m not going to be playing that piece again for a while. I write down something a conductor said or some interesting new thing I thought or tried, which I don’t want to forget. In this way, I’m able to get back quite quickly to the place where the piece was the last time I played it. I do this because I found early on, as I was juggling repertoire, that I would redo the same work and think, “I’ve discovered this new fingering,” and then realise I had found it before but forgotten. That’s just a waste of time. For me, it’s about how I can immediately get everything back into my mind so I can resume work on a piece where I left off, and still have the freshness from having put it aside.’

As it’s Thanksgiving when we talk, I ask him what he would give thanks for, if he were celebrating. ‘There’s a lot I’m grateful for. There are people who have helped me along the way and given me enormous amounts of time and advice, and that has helped me so much. And there’s the support from my family, firstly from my parents and now from my wife. I’m also thankful that after the pandemic, which was such a depressing time, we are back together with other musicians, in front of audiences. I think about that almost every time I perform. I’m thankful I get to live my life with music like this.’ There are growing numbers of people around the world who feel thankful for this too.