Pianist keeps the faith, in his life and music

STEPHEN HOUGH is religious in every sense of the word.

He believes in God; he articulates his wonder in the divine with a disarming sincerity. He is a practising Catholic who considered taking orders. He enjoys reading theology and is a regular contributor to The Tablet, the British Catholic weekly newspaper. And he is by all accounts a diligent, hard-working artist who is widely acknowledged to be one of Britain's finest concert pianists.

That he is also gay might seem like just another detail for open-minded arts aficionados. But when he takes on the Vatican's attitude to homosexuality, publicly, critically and from a position of faith, it makes waves.

Last May a tour of Vietnam was abruptly cancelled when an official from the Ministry of Culture visited the pianist's website and discovered an essay he wrote for a book titled The Way We Are Now. In it he wrote: "Reading my Bible I would fear opening the scorching pages of Romans 1 or Corinthians 6. These brief passages shine with a terrible light for a gay person."

The essay reflects on growing up as a Christian and emerging homosexual, and questions the church's position that such individuals must deny themselves the experience of love and intimacy.

Three months on, Hough is in London contemplating his forthcoming recital tour of Australia. It is extensive, with performances taking him from Perth to Coffs Harbour. He is also contemplating the publisher's contract on his desk. After the recent publication of his first book, The Bible as Prayer, a slim volume of selected verses designed as a devotional or inspirational starting point, he has been invited to write another. It is clear the new enterprise is no casual commitment.

"I'm so scared to sign," he admits, "because I'm worried about all the work involved. It is a book about the gay issue within Christianity. There's been an awful lot written about this but I've yet to find a book that pulls together the different aspects in a short, simple space. I'd love to try and do this.

"When we are involved in the arts and media it's very easy to be gay. It's not so easy if you're in the middle of a small town in an insurance office. I met someone quite recently who began to tell me about how afraid they were of their family finding out because if they did they'd have to leave home. They were still living with their parents and they were teaching the piano to children within the same community. Allowing that aspect of their identity to be found out would mean the end of their life as it was then. It was a very distressing thing to hear."

Pianist keeps the faith, in his life and music
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia