Angela Hewitt Week in Ottawa has begun! I will arrive back there tomorrow. The Ottawa Citizen has been very generous with three articles this week (see links below). Along with some wonderful helpers and friends, we have been organizing these events and hope that many of you in the Ottawa area will be able to attend! And don't forget the concert on Friday night with the Schumann Piano Quartet!

In the meantime, I'm out on the West Coast performing two all-Baroque recitals. I don't know if I've ever given such a programme--Bach, Couperin, and Rameau all together in one go. It's great, actually, even if incredibly demanding on my concentration. All those trills! In Salem I performed for the first time on the new Yamaha CFX concert grand--an excellent piano. St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Salem was the first to purchase it in the States, and they have a lovely one. I used to play a lot in Oregon (will be going back there in July for the Oregon Bach Festival), and it's always a pleasure. Staying with friends in Portland, I was able to see the rhododendrons in full bloom (see photo). A beautiful time of year to be there. Tonight I repeat the same concert in Seattle's Meany Auditorium.

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Entertainment/Music/A%20hometown%20welcome/6624451/story.html

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/Sublime+Schumann+Hewitt+latest+disc/6611816/story.html

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/Gould+piano+takes+place+honour+with+video/6606851/story.html

It has been a busy time since the end of April. The days fly by. I have a million pieces to work on, what with my festival less than two months away. From now until mid-July there's no breather at all. Good thing I'm feeling great again! The recitals in the USA have all been a huge pleasure: first Amherst, MA where I hadn't been before. A lovely college town with an excellent audience. While eating dinner in the hotel restaurant just an hour before the pre-concert talk and recital, I heard a man saying a few seats away from me, "Angela Hewitt's in town tonight! It's amazing she's here!" I wanted to say, she's closer than you think, but....The dogwood was in bloom all over the place and looked beautiful. Then I went down to Atlanta and played in the lovely Spivey Hall where I have such a fan club. Also gave a masterclass, and a private event tied to my festival. A group of 17 Spivey Hall Friends, including their artistic director Sam Dixon, is attending my festival in Italy this summer for the second time (they come every two years). In the photo I'm with Susan Hunter (who arranges the tour) and her husband Jeff Adams, sponsors of my recital. The warmth of the crowd and their enthusiasm could not have been bettered. After a few days in Ottawa working like crazy, I crossed the border again and flew to Washington for another private festival event in the home of Pat and Stan Palombo (also coming to Italy with a big group of friends) and played a recital in Shriver Hall, Baltimore, on the campus of Johns Hopkins University. I hadn't played there since May 2006. The large audience of 1000, even if a bit noisy at times for my taste, seemed to really love the programme of Couperin, Faure, Bach and Ravel. It looked as though I had changed it, but that wasn't the case at all. My former agents had messed things up, giving the promoter the wrong information. That was only discovered recently. With my new agency, that won't happen!

For those of you in Ottawa or not far away, it would be great if you would join me for a very special event on May 20th at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. At 3 pm in the Studio, the Canadian Friends of the Trasimeno Music Festival will be showing the first-ever public screening of the CBC telecast of the finals of the 1985 International Bach Piano Competition in which I was awarded first prize. I will also perform briefly. Admission is free with a donation to the Canadian Friends of the Trasimeno Music Festival gratefully accepted. At 4:30 pm in the Salon, there will be a unique display of some 20 or so of my concert gowns, beginning with the first one age nine! All carefully preserved! The photo is of me in one of them, age 15. Admission is by donation. Please write to cftmf@trasimenomusicfestival.com for more details.

Last Wednesday night I was invited to be the guest on national Italian radio (RAI Radio 3 Suite) in a programme called "La Stanza della Musica". For one hour and twenty minutes non-stop, I performed a recital of Bach, Couperin, Debussy, and Ravel in front of a studio audience . Along with that, I was interviewed by the host, Andrea Penna, in Italian. I survived! In these days when broadcasters are being cut back almost all over the world (the situation in Canada is terrible), it's great that Italy (who goodness knows has its problems...) still has something of the sort. It was so appreciated by not only the audience there, but people around the country who are still talking about it. We spoke quite a bit about the music itself in order to help people's appreciation of it. And of course it was great to see Rome again in the sunshine, even if driving in the cobblestone streets tore up my insides which I thought had completely healed after my surgery....!

Last night I was in Udine in the north of Italy, between Venice and Trieste. For the first time in my life, I performed extracts from Bach's Art of Fugue (the first four Contrapuncti). It will be my constant companion now for several years to come. I must push on with the rest. And I also played the beautiful Thème et Variations by Gabriel Fauré for the first time in many years--a piece I learned in my youth. I'll be recording a Fauré CD this coming August. In my break during the past two weeks, besides practising day and night, I wrote the CD notes for my Debussy album which will be out, I think, in time for Christmas.

As of today, April 5th, I am extending my representation with the London agency, Harrison Parrott, to general worldwide management. This will definitely simplify my life to a great extent, and I very much look forward to working with them on my entire schedule. The only regional agents I will keep are Lorenzo Baldrighi in Italy and Yuji Arai of the Amati agency in Japan. My thanks go to all the agents, especially Intermusica, who have worked for me over the past eight years and with whom I have always had a good relationship. It's just time to move on, and I'm very excited about what the future might hold! Please see the Contact page of this website for all the details.

http://www.harrisonparrott.com/news/2012/04/angela-hewitt-extends-representation-harrisonparrott-worldwide-management

Tickets to individual concerts of my 2012 Trasimeno Music Festival, to be held in Umbria from June 30 to July 6, are now on sale for Friends of the Festival. They are selling fast, so we advise early booking! To do so, please visit the festival website:

http://www.trasimenomusicfestival.com/news.php

It was a great feeling to be back on stage last Friday night in Dublin. And I couldn't have been happier, playing the Ravel G major with Hannu Lintu and the RTE National Symphony Orchestra. They are having their financial problems at the moment (terrible cuts), and the audience was not large, but they were hugely appreciative and that was nice. It also went out live on radio to many more. For those people who think Ravel shouldn't be too romantic because he never showed emotion himself (there are such people), let me share with you something Hannu yelled out to the orchestra in rehearsal when whatever they were playing was rather insipid. "More erotic!" he urged them. "It's not internet dating!" And so many other fresh ideas that in 38 years of playing that piece I had never heard before. A breath of fresh air. The Lutoslawski Concerto for Orchestra that they did in the second half had me holding onto the edge of my seat. That's how a concert should be.

Tonight in Cremona I gave a big recital programme of Bach, Ravel, and Couperin for an appreciative crowd. The Teatro Ponchielli dates from 1747, and it had a lot of atmosphere for that music. I didn't have time to see much of the town, but the centre is beautiful and of course there's the statue of Stradivarius who lived and worked here. There are still violin makers all over the place.

I shouldn't go on about another travel horror story, but that is what I had courtesy of the terrible Ryanair at Stansted the other night, flying to Bergamo. I had paid for two suitcases totalling 35 kilos (I have a lot of books and scores with me). A man kindly helped me put them on the scale, but put the small one on first which was then weighed and sent off. When the big one went on, I was told that it was 21 kilos instead of 20. The other had been 12 and I was allowed 15. So I said what's the problem? I was still under the 35 kilos. They refused to accept it. And then they put me through the worst experience imaginable--making me go through so many channels (and security with that large bag, and at one point there were five agents standing there and not one of them would help me put it on the x-ray machine). I still can't lift bags. Anyway--it's too long a story for here. I was terribly upset about it all. Ryanair is the worst airline in the world. They simply don't care. How some people can be so inhumane is beyond me. Thank goodness the music tonight made up for it. The photo, by the way, is just so you can see that I'm doing OK again...

I know that many of you are wondering how I am, so I will give you a brief update! First of all, thank you to all those who have written me for your wonderful support and friendship. It means so much when one is recovering from such an ordeal. After two weeks in the city where I had the surgery, I returned to Ottawa (a nightmare of a trip with United Airlines who announced a delay of 50 minutes, only to then take off 15 minutes later when I was in the lounge--with no warning whatsoever, and my baggage going off without me--thank you very much! A dirty trick when they are overbooked). Ottawa is still my home in so many ways, and my friends there are very special. I still needed to keep quiet, and they respected that. A special thanks to the CEO of the National Arts Centre, Peter Herrndorf, and the staff of the orchestra who made sure there were bouquets of flowers already in my apartment when I arrived home. A week later I was finally ready to cross the ocean again--that's not a trip you want to make unless you're feeling in pretty good shape. The doctors here in London are amazed at my recovery. Maybe playing Bach helps. I couldn't look at the piano for ten days after my operation, but then started learning (from scratch) the first four Contrapuncti from The Art of Fugue (printing a Russian edition off the internet as I didn't have my scores with me!). Great stuff. Only in the past few days have I started playing more "physical" repertoire--the Ravel G major Concerto, for instance. One doesn't realize how much you use the whole body to play the piano until you haven't done it for a while--then every muscle in your body aches the next day! Ouch! A bit like going back to ballet after a summer vacation. I'm so looking forward to performing again next week in Dublin. Hopefully some people will show up. They tend to stay away there when Hannu Lintu conducts contemporary repertoire--how silly (on this programme there are also works by Pintscher and Lutoslawski). He does everything with such passion and commitment that it's worth hearing. If I make such an effort to be there, I hope the audience turns out as well. We'll see..!

For the moment, have a taste of something coming soon: our Schumann Concerto CD on Hyperion. It will be released worldwide in July, but you can hear snippets already on their website:

http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA67885&vw=dc

I suppose it’s time to make some sort of announcement as to why I have had to cancel my concerts since the beginning of March. From Nashville I was rushed to another American city for some emergency surgery which was performed the next day. Nobody in Nashville listening to my performances of Mozart would have known there was anything wrong, and indeed I played my very best, but I knew, and it was scary. I can’t tell you how fortunate I am in my friends around the world. One of them happens to be a leading doctor in the problems I was having, and arranged everything for me. I had the very best surgeon in the world and was looked after wonderfully. But I only took the decision to go there knowing that I also had friends with whom I could stay who would look after me when I was discharged two days later. They have given me total peace and quiet in which to recuperate which is what I need. My heartfelt thanks go to all of these people—even if they must remain anonymous to protect my whereabouts and well-being. I am not allowed to travel anywhere for several more days and must see the surgeon for a check-up before I move on. It was with great regret that I had to cancel my recitals in Copenhagen, Birmingham, and Berlin, and concerto appearances in Brussels and Ankara. But I will be there in Dublin on March 30th—don’t worry! I’ve been given the all clear, but my body needs a few more weeks to recover fully. Somebody else will have to carry my luggage for the next while. I don’t mind that at all.

In the meantime, you can watch the television broadcast of my Mozart Concerto from Helsinki last November if you click on the link below. It’s nice to relive that performance. At the end, after my encore, the TV announcer caught Hannu Lintu and myself in the wings, and did a quick interview which reminds me of the figure skating championships—interviewing the pairs after they’ve done their free-style dance. It’s very funny! Thanks to the Finnish Radio Symphony for such a lovely collaboration. The video will probably be online for another few weeks.

http://areena.yle.fi/video/1330198948417

Last week I changed time zones four times in six days. London to Ottawa to Calgary to Vancouver to Austin, Texas. Then once more arriving in Nashville, Tennessee. That was a lot. And of course my luggage had to get lost once--between Vancouver and Austin. No idea why the crews in Denver should do such a thing when they had well over an hour and a quarter to transfer it. It was late at night when I arrived, so I had to go out and buy some essentials. I can't carry everything with me. At least it finally arrived four hours before my recital. The Bach/Ravel recitals in each city were a great pleasure. In Calgary it was a recital put on by the Honens Competition who are doing a great job at making theirs a very important event. I have agreed to meet with this year's winner for a mentoring session. The next evening I was out in White Rock, BC, a suburb of Vancouver. There the intrepid George Zukerman has a waiting list for subscribers to his series--they can't fit more than 800 into the church where I played. That's a nice change from the doom and gloom stories one so often hears nowadays. In both places I played Fazioli pianos which I had previously chosen myself at the factory in Italy. It's always nice to then play them "out in the field". In Austin I gave a masterclass as well as the recital and listened to three students play Bach and Beethoven. Then on to Nashville where I was happy to perform in the new (at least since I was there last) concert hall (see photo). A huge improvement, and really a joy to play in. The orchestra was also in fine form, conducted by their young associate, Kelly Corcoran. I just ventured out once from the block between hotel and hall--in search of dinner. On the way I passed the many bars with live music and the myriad shops selling a whole range of cowboy boots. Not exactly my thing, but if you're in search of that, it's definitely the place.

Now I'm already on the other side of the ocean, but 48 hours ago I was on stage at London's Wigmore Hall, giving a programme of French mėlodies and chamber music. The soprano was the lovely Karina Gauvin from Montreal (see photo)--a true delight to work with. We had done so on one previous occasion with the Toronto Symphony years ago (in a Mozart concert aria), but this was our first time in recital and it was a huge pleasure from start to finish. We chose some of the most beautiful French repertoire by Hahn (Le Printemps especially--what a fantastic piano part if you play it with the right ėlan!), Debussy (the very erotic Chants de Bilitis), Faurė (all my favourites including Sourdine) and Bizet (which gave Karina the chance to really show her operatic side). The rest of the programme (a huge one) was made up of works for flute and piano as well as the three of us together. I was supposed to start work on the very difficult Jolivet "Chant de Linos" on Thursday morning when the flautist, Andrea Oliva from Rome, called me late Wednesday afternoon to say he couldn't make it. He is principal flute in the Orchestra of Santa Cecilia in Rome, and they were having industrial action and the long and the short of it was that if he came to London he risked losing his job. That couldn't happen of course. It was very disappointing for him, to say the least. Already he had been calling all over Europe looking for a substitute, and when he told me, I started doing the same. And continued the next morning.....it wasn't easy as everybody seemed to be booked for that weekend and there was so little time. In the end I was very lucky to get Adam Walker, the young principal flute of the London Symphony, to play at Wigmore with me. He did a fantastic job with the Jolivet and Poulenc. In Reading Town Hall, the night before, Andrea Amat, a young student from the Royal College of Music, saved the day. It's always a nightmare when that happens. A big thank you to both of them for stepping in at such short notice!