Peter Hill (pianist)

Peter P Hill (born 14 June 1948) is a British pianist and musicologist.

Biography

Hill, a native of Sheffield, was awoken to 20th century music when he bought some Schoenberg in a Winchester music shop and "played those Op.19 pieces with a kind of missionary zeal... this taught me about the only real reason for playing music – that you feel passionately about it and want to communicate something"; he later recorded all Schoenberg's piano music for the BBC.^[1] He had been a chorister as a child, read music at Oxford then continued his studies at the Royal College of Music, both with Cyril Smith with whom he studied from age of 19, and pursued a research fellowship on Xenakis at Royal Holloway College.^[1] Later he studied with Nadia Boulanger.^[2] He was a founder member of the contemporary music group Dreamtiger.^[1] He was awarded first prize at Darmstadt in 1974 for performances of music by Cage and Stockhausen.^[3] He became a lecturer in the Department of music at Sheffield University in 1976 and was co-director with violinist Peter Cropper of an MA in Music Performance course, alongside undergraduate teaching.^[3]

He was acquainted with the French composer Olivier Messiaen, visting him several times in Paris^[1] and has edited a volume of essays on Messaien's music (The Messaien Companion) and co-written a book about him.^[4][5] As well as playing the complete works of Messiaen, he is also known for his performances of other 20th-century piano repertoire.^[1] Among other recordings are Beethoven's Diabelli Variations (for which he also wrote the booklet essay),^[2] a Schubert lieder recital with soprano Lynda Russell on Naxos, Stravinsky, and music of the Second Viennese School (Schoenberg, Berg and Webern).^[3] Of his first recording, the complete piano music of Brian issued in 1982, John Ogdon in Tempo commented that the "playing is remarkable for its even tone control: alternately lyrical and dynamic, it suggests at times the influence of Busoni and Petri."^[2]

Hill's career has taken him to Europe and the United States.^[2] He is now an Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Sheffield^[6] and a Fellow of the Royal Northern College of Music.^[7]

In November 2013, he gave the world premiere of Messiaen's piano piece La Fauvette passerinette (1961), which he discovered and edited for performance.^[8]

Publications

• Hill, Peter (1994). The Messiaen Companion.^[6]
• Hill, Peter (2000). Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-62714-1.
• Hill, Peter; Simeone, Nigel (2005). Messiaen. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-10907-8.^[4]
• Hill's recordings of Messiaen's piano music, made under the guidance of the composer, for Unicorn-Kanchana, were later available on the Regis label.^[6]