Susanne Hou’s natural born talent

December 9, 1977, was a Friday. In Halifax it was warm and
raining. In Shanghai the air was clear and dry with a slight breeze.
The day had been warm, but come evening the temperature was just above
freezing. The moon was a tiny sliver of a waning crescent. At the
Shanghai Theatre the Shanghai Symphony was performing a program
including Beethoven’s “Violin Concerto in D Major.” Alec Hou, one of
China’s best violinists, was the soloist. He played the monster
23-minute first movement and started into the 10-minute second
movement. Later he said he felt something miraculous during that second
movement. He was right.

Yi-Jia Susanne Hou was born in Shanghai, on December 9, 1977, while
her father was playing that second movement. Tonight (Thursday,
February 12) at the Rebecca Cohn, she’ll play that very same music with
Symphony Nova Scotia—that monster first movement and then that
miraculous second movement. Another miracle: She’s here to play two
concerts (the second is in Lunenburg on Friday, February 13) because
the scheduled soloist, tenor Terence Mierau, has had to cancel an
appearance.

The Beethoven is a big, solid war-horse. It’s not heard so often
anymore because it’s very difficult, raining physical demands onto the
soloist. Susanne Hou will have no trouble. On the phone from her home
base of New York City, she says, “It’s very special to me. I was born
to play this. I didn’t publicly perform it until quite recently in my
musical career—a couple of years ago. Not because of the level of
difficulty, but I think because it’s a very musically mature
piece.”

Her father has remained important in Hou’s career. He made her first
violin—a tiny bijou a little smaller than one-sixteenth the regular
size. (In a documentary called Shanghai Sensation available at
cbc.ca, he plays “Jimmy Crack Corn” on
it.) Alec Hou brought his wife Emily and Susanne to live in Thunder
Bay, Ontario, and then Mississauga. When Susanne was 12, she became a
student of the amazing New York teacher Dorothy DeLay. The family
didn’t move there. Alec Hou drove eight hours for his daughter to have
a two-hour lesson, then eight hours back: twice a month for four years.
He also made the bow she uses now.

In Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book, Outliers: The Story of
Success, he writes about a study which shows that it takes 10,000
hours of focused practice by the age of 20 to become a world-class
musician. Hou says she got 10,000 hours in during her first 10 years of
study. She started at age four. Hou doesn’t believe in a formula to
determine skill, but she does believe in early learning. “I was so
young I don’t remember learning a lot of difficult things and I didn’t
read music until after I learned many very difficult things. A lot of
it went very deep into my muscle memory.”

The first time Hou got a first-rate violin was her second year at
Juilliard: After she won an international competition, the school
loaned her its Avery Fisher Stradivarius.

Now she plays the ex Heath 1729 Guarneri del Gesu. She loves it
deeply, but it’s not hers. “Violins are very personal,” she says, “like
people. I turned down three Stradiveri violins when I won the Canada
Council competition. Twice! I can’t explain it other than it’s like
falling in love: you know that you know.” Hou’s voice drops and slows
down. “Very sadly, Halifax is one of the last concerts I’ll be playing
on this violin. In August I have to give it back because it’s the end
of my second term—I can have it for only two terms.” Hou isn’t sure
what she’ll do for an instrument. “I first have to decide if I will
compete for the other Canada Council violins—if I were fortunate
enough to win would I want a Strad?—or if I’ll pursue other venues. I
have to make that decision. It’s a very painful one that I don’t even
want to think about even though I have to.

“I see the Guarneri every day. It has a direct connection with my
innermost journey. It’s my voice. It’s like the Little Mermaid being
stripped of her voice.”

Susanne Hou and Symphony Nova Scotia, Thursday, Feb.
12 at the Rebecca Cohn, 6101 University, 7:30pm, $32-$47.50, 494-3820,
symphonynovascotia.ca.
Friday, Feb. 13, St. John’s Anglican Church, Lunenburg, 7:30pm, $25,
(902) 634-4994.

This article appears in Feb 12-18, 2009.