Listening Ahead
Our Critics’ Choices of Upcoming Events in the Bay Area
for November 11 – 24, 2008
Recital
Piano Fever
Concerts Grand, the North Bay’s only piano recital series, curated by SFCV’s own Terry McNeill, charges into another season, with the local debut recital of Russian Elena Ulyanova. The program is full of big pieces, from Beethoven’s “Appassionata Sonata,” and Chopin’s Andante spianato and Grand polonaise brillante, to Rachmaninov’s Sonata No. 2 in B-flat, Op. 36.
Nov. 14, 7 p.m., St. Hilary’s Church, Tiburon, $25-$50, (707) 526-2447, www.concertsgrand.com. (M.Z.)
Elena Ulyanova
Arnaldo Cohen!!
If Arnaldo Cohen was once “the greatest pianist you’ve never heard of,” as The Chicago Tribune critic John von Rhein wrote a few years ago, if his admirers were once an “underground swell,” as Allan Ulrich put it in The San Francisco Chronicle in 2001, he has put himself on the map since then. Philadelphia concertgoers have been especially blessed with his performances at the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society as well as with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Here’s a player who has been compared to many of the 20th century’s greatest pianists. His San Francisco Performances recital, in which he offers a generous selection of Brazilian composers as well as the four Chopin Ballades, should be something to talk about.
Nov. 22, 8 p.m., $32-$49, (415) 398-6449, www.performances.org. (M.Z.)
Early Music
Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra
“Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven” may sound like a chapter heading in a music-history text, but in the context of a Philharmonia Baroque program with Nicholas McGegan at the helm, it’s a recipe for a fine two-hour romp. The centerpiece is the Beethoven “Triple” Concerto, which is one piece that the historical-performance movement — ordinarily gung-ho to tackle Beethoven — has given suspiciously scant attention. Can the ridiculously difficult solo cello part have anything to do with that? Tanya Tomkins tackles the beast here, with Colin Jacobsen on violin and Eric Zivian, better known in his modern-pianist guise, on fortepiano as co-soloists. Mozart (the “Haffner”) and Haydn (No. 88) symphonies round out the program.
Nov. 13, 8 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco; Nov. 14, 8 p.m., First United Methodist Church, Palo Alto; Nov. 15, 8 p.m., Nov. 16, 7:30 p.m., First Congregational Church, Berkeley; $30-$75, (415) 252-1288, www.philharmonia.org. (M.D.T.)
Contemporary
Eulogy for a Departed Species
As usual, Nicole Paiement’s BluePrint Festival at the San Francisco Conservatory offers some of the most interesting programs of contemporary music. In this month’s edition, Philip Collins mourns the extinction of another frog species in Requies ranarum. The other works are more introspective, including the premiere of the Conservatory-commissioned Transparent Walls by Aleksandra Vrebalov, Giya Kancheli’s Midday Prayers,, and Young-Shin Choi’s XY Unsquared.
Nov. 15, 3 p.m., San Francisco Conservatory of Music Recital Hall, $15-$20, (415) 503-6275, www.sfcm.edu. (M.Z.)
Nicole Paiement
Chamber Music
The Messiaen Centenary
Olivier Messiaen’s centenary is in December, and Stanford Lively Arts celebrates the visionary composer in style. Scott St. John, violin, and Christopher Costanza, cello, both from the St. Lawrence String Quartet, are joined by clarinetist Todd Palmer and pianist Jamie Parker for Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. Written while the composer was a prisoner of war during World War II and a product of Messiaen’s Catholic mysticism, the Quartet is a seminal 20th-century chamber work. Robert Huw Morgan rounds out the program with a selection of organ works, Messiaen’s own instrument.
Nov. 13, 8 p.m., Memorial Church, Stanford University, $22-$44, (650) 723-2551, http://livelyarts.stanford.edu (L.H.)
St. Lawrence Quartet
Imani Winds
The Imani Winds are a genre-bending African-American group (with some Latino roots as well), whose mission is to illuminate new music. Here, they join with another fine ensemble, the Miami String Quartet for a program of seminal works by Ginastera (Impressiones de la Puna), Villa-Lobos (Quintette en forme de Chôros), and Astor Piazzolla, as well as a new piece Concierto de Cámara by Roberto Sierra.
Nov. 19, 8 p.m., Stanford University’s Dinkelspiel Auditorium, $17-$38, (510) 642-9988, http://livelyarts.stanford.edu. (C.G.)
Guarneri Farewell
After 45 years, the fabled Guarneri String Quartet bids farewell, not with tears, but by embracing the new. In the company of the young Johannes String Quartet, their San Francisco Performances program balances the time-honored beauty of Mendelssohn’s Octet with the Bay Area premiere of William Bolcom’s Octet: Double Quartet. Two additional Bay Area premieres, quartets by Esa-Pekka Salonen and Derek Bermel, make for a night of rejoicing and promise.
Nov. 20, 8 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco, $32-49, (415) 392-2545, www.performances.org. (J.V.S.)
Guarneri String Quartet
Welcome, Quartet of Death
Music at Kohl Mansion takes a dip into the emerging artists’ pool, presenting the La Catrina String Quartet in a program of music of Mexican composers, as well as Astor Piazzolla’s Four For Tango and the Grieg String Quartet. Founded in 2001, the quartet takes its name from the figure of Death in Mexican folklore. Don’t bother wearing black.
Nov. 23, 7 p.m., Kohl Mansion, Burlingame, $20-$42, (650) 762-1130, www.musicatkohl.org. (M.Z.)
Symphony
Summers Past
Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6, the “Pastoral,” which the San Francisco Symphony plays this week under Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas is his one overtly programmatic symphony (if you discount the “Battle Symphony,” Wellington’s Victory). It stands in a long line of 18th-century symphonies with pastoral elements (maybe you know The Four Seasons?). Of course, Beethoven extends the tradition in a personal way, the result of his summer stays in the country. That’s what connects it to James Agee’s poem, Knoxville, Summer of 1913, which Samuel Barber set as an extended concerted piece for soprano and orchestra. Haydn does a different kind of programmatic music for his Symphony No. 60, “Il distratto” (The absent-minded man), which was originally music to accompany a stage play by the same name. This is inventive programming in the highest degree.
Nov. 13-15, 8 p.m.; Nov. 16, 2 p.m.; Davies Symphony Hall, $30-$130, (415) 864-6000, www.sfsymphony.org. (M.Z.)
Crazy in Love, and Just Plain Crazy
Two people coming together is celebrated by Michael Morgan and the Oakland East Bay Symphony, with a new piece by Nathaniel Stookey dubbed “a breathless affair for two singers and orchestra,” and Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet suites. The Stookey work, Zipperz, will incorporate the zippered-poetry form pioneered by librettist Dan Harder (see www.danharder.com for an example). The concert begins with a 12-minute funhouse of jokes by the “bad-boy of music,” George Antheil — his Jazz Symphony.
Nov. 14, 8 p.m., Paramount Theater, Oakland, $20-$65, (510) 444-0801, www.oebs.org. (J.D.)
Michael Morgan
Symphony of a Thousand
That title for this 1910 Mahler symphony is usually a bit of an exaggeration, but this is an enormous work, in length, breadth, ambition, majesty … and the number of performers. The text includes medieval Latin hymns and the hour-long closing scene of Goethe’s Faust. Michael Tilson Thomas conducts a full orchestra, offstage instruments, three choruses, and eight soloists, including Laura Claycomb, Anthony Dean Griffey, and James Morris.
Nov. 19, 21, 22, 8 p.m.; Nov. 23, 4 p.m., Davies Symphony Hall, $35-$65, (415) 864-6000, www.sfsymphony.org. (J.G.)
Redwood Symphony Plays Jewish Music
The Redwood Symphony continues its quest for interesting programming with a concert of Jewish-themed (mostly) music by contemporary Jewish composers, performed in one of the Bay Area’s most beautiful contemporary-styled synagogues. How cool is that? The program includes the klezmer-inspired Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind by Osvaldo Golijov and Steve Reich’s amazing psalms setting Tehillim, as well as works by Philip Glass and Lukas Foss. Music director Eric Kujawsky conducts.
Nov. 23, 3 p.m., Congregation Beth Am, Los Altos Hills, $10-$25, (650) 366-6872, www.redwoodsymphony.org (D.B.)
Eric Kujawsky
Dance
Dance Inventor
The prodigiously creative dancer/choreographer Merce Cunningham has lived long enough to see dance history written around him. In November, he brings his company back to Berkeley, a tour stop for half a century now. The programs include some of his iconic works with John Cage, including 1958’s Suite for Five, as well as some newer works such as eyeSpace (2006-2007), and Split Sides (2003), to music by Radiohead and Sigur Ros.
Nov. 14-15, 8 p.m.; Zellerbach Hall, Berkeley, $26-$48, (510) 642-9988, www.calperfs.berkeley.edu. (M.Z.)
Toreador Revived
Ballet San Jose brings an unusual and rarely performed full-length work to the stage in November, The Toreador, choreographed by Flemming Flindt, after the renowned 19th-century master of the Royal Danish Ballet, August Bournonville. Symphony Silicon Valley, under the baton of Dwight Oltman, will breathe life into the score. The costumes and scenery come straight from Denmark’s Royal Opera House.
Nov. 20-22, 8 p.m.; Nov. 23, 1:30 p.m., San Jose Center for the Performing Arts, $25-$85, (408) 288-2820, www.balletsanjose.org. (M.Z.)
Choral
Pacific Collegium
The Oakland-based Pacific Collegium, now in residence at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, can be heard twice a month singing the Latin Mass at St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church. This week, however, they can be heard in concert in music of the French Baroque: Louis-Nicolas Clerambault’s setting of Psalm 51 for Louis XIV’s Royal Chapel, and works by Marc-Antoine Charpentier and others. Tonia D’Amelio, Celeste Winant, and Jennifer Paulino are the soloists.
Nov. 15, 8:00 p.m., St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church, San Francisco; Nov. 16, 4:00 p.m., St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Oakland, $10-$20, www.pacificcollegium.org. (M.Z.)
Song of Norway
Widely acclaimed as the group most likely to fill the shoes of the now-disbanded but still beloved vocal quartet Anonymous 4, Trio Mediæval has taken their own path, and ordered their own boots for use in Norway. The Oslo-based women’s group comes to Herbst Theatre, thanks to San Francisco Performances, with a program of Norwegian folk songs and medieval ballads.
Nov. 16, 7 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco, $32-$42, (415) 398-6449, www.performances.org.. (M.Z.)
Trio Mediæval
Chora Nova-ish
Chora Nova is, as its name implies, still a relatively new kid on the block. But the results from the first two seasons show a record of high accomplishment under their director, Paul Flight. They may have to accept their “established” status soon. Unlike many choirs, Chora Nova is equally active in the “early music” and modern ends of the repertory. The upcoming concert shows off the chorus in “Masterworks of the Baroque Era,” a title that allows a wide range of programming choices, to say the least.
Nov. 22, 8 p.m., First Congregational Church of Berkeley, $10-$20, http://choranova.org (M.Z.)
Opera
The Elixir of Love
The simplest and most enchanting of love stories (see review), with Donizetti’s irresistible music, and a brilliant cast, including Inva Mula (the seven-foot-tall “blue diva” of The Fifth Element) as Adina, Ramón Vargas as Nemorino, and the San Francisco debuts of Giorgio Caoduro (Belcore) and Alessandro Corbelli (Dulcamara). Bruno Campanella conducts, James Robinson is stage director. The opera is 2 1/2 hours long, but a “family edition” presents a 2-hour version, with recent Adler Fellows in the principal roles, and reduced admission.
Nov. 14 and 18, 8 p.m.; Nov. 23, 2 p.m.; Nov. 26. 7:30 p.m., War Memorial Opera House, $15-$260, (family performances: $20-$80), (415) 864-3330, www.sfopera.com. (J.G.)
Inva Mula
Bohemian Rhapsody
Perennially popular, Puccini’s La Bohème is sometimes left to fend for itself in the casting department. But the San Francisco Opera has taken the opposite approach, engaging international superstar Angela Gheorghiu and star-in-the-making Piotr Beczala as Mimì and Rodolfo, and also rounding out the cast with attractive singers. The second cast looks just as strong and might be the sleeper pick of the opera season. Music Director-designate Nicola Luisotti conducts.
Nov. 16 – Dec. 7, various times, War Memorial Opera House, $20-$290, (415) 864-3330, www.sfopera.com. (M.Z.)
Kafka Fragments
Dawn Upshaw, soprano, MacArthur Fellow, majestic champion of new music, and Geoff Nuttall, first violinist of the St. Lawrence String Quartet, bring to Cal Performances an acclaimed production of György Kurtág’s Kafka Fragments. Under the direction of Peter Sellars, the two have performed the piece several times since 2005, when the staging was created for the Perspective series that Upshaw curated at Carnegie Hall. Kurtág sets excerpts from Kafka’s diaries, letters, and notebooks. In a 2005 interview with Jeremy Eichler, then of The New York Times, Upshaw said that on first hearing Kafka Fragments she was devastated by it and thought she was not up to singing it; Nuttall termed the violin part “borderline unplayable.” Nevertheless, despite the daunting musical and dramatic challenges of the piece, Upshaw and Nuttall have been acclaimed in previous performances, and this promises to be one of the highlights of the fall season.
Nov. 23, 7 p.m., Nov. 24, 8 p.m., Zellerbach Playhouse, Berkeley, $68, (510) 642-9988, www.performances.org. (L.H.)
Jeff Dunn is a freelance critic with a B.A. in music and a Ph.D. in geologic education. A composer of piano and vocal music, he is a member of the National Association of Composers, USA, and serves on the boards of Composers, Inc. and New Music Bay Area.
Janos Gereben (janosg@gmail.com) is a regular contributor to San Francisco Classical Voice.
Catherine Getches is managing editor of San Francisco Classical Voice. Her writing has appeared in publications such as The Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, Salon.
Lisa Hirsch is a technical writer. She studied music at Brandeis and SUNY/Stony Brook.
Jason Victor Serinus writes about music for Opera News, Opera Now, American Record Guide, Stereophile, San Francisco Magazine, Muso, Carnegie Hall Playbill, East Bay Express, East Bay Monthly, San Francisco Examiner, Bay Area Reporter, hometheaterhifi.com, and other publications.
Michelle Dulak Thomson is a violinist and violist who has written about music for Strings, Stagebill, Early Music America, and The New York Times.
Michael Zwiebach holds a Ph.D. in music history from UC Berkeley.
©2008 By Jeff Dunn, Janos Gereben, Catherine Getches, Lisa Hirsch, Jason Victor Serinus, Michelle Dulak Thomson, Michael Zwiebach, all rights reserved.