Michael Houston to tour with Beethoven

Acclaimed New Zealand pianist Michael Houstoun performs all 32 of the composer's piano sonatas in 40 concerts nationwide in Beethoven reCYCLE 2013.

Part of Chamber Music New Zealand’s Kaleidoscopes season, it includes 12 concerts in four main centres.

The tour began in Napier on 10 March and heads to Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland during April. The Auckland concerts, on Friday 19, Saturday 20 and Monday 22 next month, are part of the 2013 New Zealand International Piano Festival. 

Michael Houstoun is not only New Zealand’s foremost Beethoven pianist, but internationally he ranks among the great Beethoven pianists of our age. The Beethoven reCYCLE tour celebrates his 60th birthday with this historic cycle of 32 Beethoven sonatas, some of the supreme treasures of human artistic endeavour. 

“It was Beethoven who woke me up to myself as a musician. The thing about Beethoven is that he somehow synthesises human psychological truths, with all of their subtlety and all of their range, into music,” Mr Houston says. 

“Beethoven’s cycle of 32 piano sonatas is remarkable and were written the whole length of his creative life, from the early Op 2 dedicated to Haydn to the mighty Op 111 which takes the piano into the realms of pure imagination.”

The famous names of the Beethoven sonatas – Moonlight, Pathétique, Appassionata – have all entered popular culture; film, television, dance and drama have all taken inspiration from these iconic pieces and are loved by pianists around the world.

Part One of Beethoven reCYCLE includes three programmes each featuring either the Waldstein, Tempest or Hammerklavier and will be performed during March and April in Auckland, Napier, Wellington and Christchurch.

Part Two of Beethoven reCYCLE features Appassionata in 10 centres in June and August, while the final part of Beethoven reCYCLE has three concerts each in Auckland, Wellington, Napier and Christchurch in October and November.

CHAMBER MUSIC NEW ZEALAND 2013 KALEIDOSCOPES SEASON: BEETHOVEN reCYCLE Part One

Programme One, ‘Waldstein’:
Sonata in D, Op.10 No.3
Sonata quasi una fantasia in E flat, Op.27 No.1
Sonata in E, Op.14 No.1
Sonata in A flat, Op.26
Sonata in C, Op.53 ‘Waldstein’

Programme Two, ‘Tempest’
Sonata in G minor, Op.49 No.1
Sonata in F, Op.10 No.2
Sonata in B flat, Op.22
Sonata in D minor, Op.31 No.2 ‘Tempest’
Sonata in A, Op.101

Programme Three, ‘Hammerklavier’
Sonata in C minor, Op.10 No.1
Sonata in G, Op.14 No.2
Sonata in F, Op.54
Sonata in B flat, Op.106 ‘Hammerklavier’

NAPIER: Municipal Theatre | Sunday, March 24, 5pm Tempest
CHRISTCHURCH: Middleton Grange Performing Arts Centre | Thursday, April 4, 7.30pm |Waldstein
CHRISTCHURCH: Middleton Grange Performing Arts Centre | Friday, April 5, 7.30pm | Tempest
CHRISTCHURCH: Middleton Grange Performing Arts Centre | Saturday, April 6, 4pm | Hammerklavier
NAPIER: Municipal Theatre | Sunday, April 7, 5pm | Hammerklavier
WELLINGTON: Ilott Theatre, Wellington Town Hall | Friday, April 12, 7.30pm |Waldstein
WELLINGTON: Ilott Theatre, Wellington Town Hall | Sunday, April 14, 5pm | Tempest
WELLINGTON: Ilott Theatre, Wellington Town Hall | Monday, April 15, 7.30pm | Hammerklavier
AUCKLAND: Concert Chamber, Auckland Town Hall, THE EDGE | Friday, April 19, 8pm | Waldstein | Part of the 2013 New Zealand International Piano Festival
AUCKLAND: Concert Chamber, Auckland Town Hall, THE EDGE | Saturday, April 20, 4.30pm | Tempest | Part of the 2013 New Zealand International Piano Festival
AUCKLAND: Concert Chamber, Auckland Town Hall, THE EDGE | Monday, April 22, 8pm | Hammerklavier | Part of the 2013 New Zealand International Piano Festival