San Francisco Classical Voice

Street Named to Head California Symphony

Stacey Street, interim executive director of the Philharmonia Baroque since George Gelles left the top position there in February, has been named executive director of the California Symphony, succeeding Millie Mitchell, who is retiring.

Street served as the Philharmonia's director of marketing and development since 1997, she held positions with the San Francisco Opera and the Jewish Museum since relocated from Boston, where she worked for the Handel & Haydn Society. Although born and raised in New York City, Street's San Francisco roots go back to the mid-19th century when her great-great-great-grandfather George Van Gorden arrived here, later to become owner of a stock ranch near Danville.

Street will stay with the Philharmonia and music director Nicholas McGegan until August 24, and will then go to Walnut Creek to work with California Symphony founder-music director Barry Jekowsky. What will happen at the Philharmonia? Apparently, the search for a new director is close to resolution and an appointment will be announced before September.

Meanwhile, Gelles has just been appointed executive director of the Hanover Band in England, succeeding Stephen Neiman (husband of Hanover Band founder Caroline Brown) who becomes chairman of the orchestra's band. Gelles, it will be recalled, left the Philharmonia Baroque post, to become vice president/executive director-designate of the Carmel Bach Festival, then, deciding to go to London instead, unceremoniously abandoned that position in April before ever assuming the responsibilities. Thus he left two organizations in the lurch, almost at one blow.

Who Let the Tiger Out?

If the Examiner's new music critic, Tiger Hashimoto, and veteran San Francisco critic Stephanie von Buchau are never seen together, the likely reason is that they are the one and the same.

New Mechem Opera

San Francisco composer Kirke Mechem, whose 1980 Tartuffe has been performed over 200 times — a rare accomplishment for a contemporary work, is at the orchestration phase of new comic opera, The Newport Rivals, based on Sheridan's The Rivals.

The Wiener Kammeroper is coproducing Tartuffe with the Kaye Playhouse in New York, where performances are scheduled in September, before 17 shows in Vienna in May and June with the same cast. The stage director is Joseph LoSchiavo. Cal Stewart Kellogg conducts in New York, Paul Weigl in Vienna. In September, Tartuffe will have its first German-language production, in Hagen. The opera has already been performed in Chinese and in Russian (playing in repertory in St. Petersburg for three years), and it is being prepared for a Czech-language production.

Music on the Web

BBC3, always a good spot for music on the Web (www.bbc.co.uk/radio3) is the place to be for the next few weeks, during BBC Proms 2001. On Wednesday, August 1, from 6 a.m. on [all times here are Pacific Daylight Time], Saturday's concert will be repeated, featuring the music of "British pastoralist" Gerald Finzi, including his Cello Concerto, with Raphael Wallfisch as soloist.

Later on Wednesday, beginning at 11:30 a.m., BBC3 has a live broadcast from the Royal Albert Hall, featuring Renée Fleming in Mozart's Exsultate, Jubilate and Strauss' Four Last Songs, with Christoph Eschenbach conducting. On Thursday, the live broadcast (also 11:30 a.m.) will offer Weill's seldom-performed Royal Palace, with Janice Watson. On Saturday at 11:30 a.m., Holst's The Planets is paired with the world premiere of John Tavener's Song of the Cosmos.

A truly big spot for opera broadcasts is now the CBC's Web site (CBC Calendar). Entitled Saturday Afternoon at the Opera, the program at 10:30 a.m. PDT (1:30 p.m. EDT) broadcasts the leading companies. This Saturday, August 4, it will be Messiaen's Saint-François d'Assise from the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw, with Heidi Grant Murphy and David Wilson-Johnson. A week from Saturday it will be Fauré's Pénélope from the Théatre des Champs-Elysées, and it continues on the following Saturdays from the Semperoper Dresden, the Vienna State Opera, Bayreuth, La Scala, and around the continent.

Rosenberg Tells (Almost) All

In the Sunday New York Times of July 29, Anna Midgette has a profile of Pamela Rosenberg, who becomes San Francisco Opera's general manager on August 1. Calling the Rosenberg appointment "one of the best things to happen to American opera in a long time," this music critic's article deals at length with the matter of the new opera boss' cancellation of contracts and projects set up by outgoing manager Lotfi Mansouri, first reported here four months ago.

In the interview, Rosenberg acknowledges the buyouts, expressing concern specifically about the cancellation of local favorite Olga Borodina ("She's the only one I'm really worried about"), and she goes on to reveal that Mansouri planned not only the next season, but two more after that. Although normal advance planning and hiring in opera stretches for 3–4 years, Rosenberg said, "I'm willing to administer someone else's planning for one year but not for three years, especially since you're bringing me in because you want change."

In a notable bit of new information in the Times story, Rosenberg volunteers that she will try to mount Verdi's Macbeth specifically for Thomas Hampson. Not attributed to her, but part of the lengthy article, is the possibility that John Adams may be the composer to create a new work for the company in the "Faust Project."

Rosenberg is trying to comfort her future constituency by "not setting out to convert San Francisco to Luigi Nono just yet." Rosenberg and Midgette probably don't realize that in staid old San Francisco, a certain Michael Tilson Thomas has already foisted Nono and even more contemporary composers on the defenseless city, and for sold-out performances at that, in Davies Hall, just down the street from the War Memorial Opera House.

(Mis)Conducting Money

Henry Yu, director and chief conductor of the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, was arrested last week on charges of stealing more than $800,000 of the orchestra's funds. Yu, who has conducted the orchestra as it performed with the Bolshoi Ballet and other international dance companies, was fingered by Hong Kong's Independent Commission Against Corruption, which charged the money was diverted to bank accounts held by Yu and his family.

In addition to the alleged embezzlement, Yu is also charged with falsely claiming that his wife worked for the Sinfonietta. She received an annual salary of $64,000. The orchestra, left without funds, was disbanded when Yu quit his job. The Hong Kong government is reorganizing the orchestra under new leadership.

The Skinny on Bob Smith

Former San Francisco music critic Paul Moor has been working in Berlin for the past decade and one of his early-spotting feats was a heads-up on Thomas Quasthoff. Coming from such a source, "attention must be paid." Moor is wildly enthusiastic about the young, up-and-coming tenor Robert Dean Smith, who just happens to be heading our way to sing Walther in SFO's October Die Meistersinger.

Moor says the tenor from Kansas may well be "the next best Heldentenor in the world. . . . I confidently expect his (San Francisco appearance) to cause a nationwide operatic sensation."

Others present a different picture. Richard Davies writes from London: "Have seen him twice, first as Walther in Meistersinger — nice, medium-sized voice with a cutting edge, well produced, tasteful, doesn't tire, but a wooden presence and unsympathetic. Those who listen and don't see are forever hailing him, while those who both see and hear know better. A good Lohengrin even so. But no way the next heroic tenor."

Last week, German reviews of Bayreuth's opening-night Meistersinger described Smith's Walther as "dull — routine — no power in reserve — no focus." It will be fascinating to hear the singer for ourselves. But a local newspaper review reported that Smith's debut as Siegmund in Bayreuth's Die Walküre on Sunday was greeted by "giant applause — for a respectable — reliable performance — which also showed that he has even more potential in reserve."

The Ethnic Beat

Writing about the Stern Grove "Asian Massive" concert (August 12) in last week's Music News, I was certain that the genre is new only to classical music fans. It came as a surprise when a certified ethnomusicologist (and distinguished author of books about Lou Harrison, the Grateful Dead, and Javanese and Chinese music), Professor Fred Lieberman of the UC Santa Cruz Music Department, responded to the item by writing:

"Despite being an ethnomusicologist who teaches pop music and tries to stay current with ethnic fusion style, it's the first I've seen the name [of Asian Massive]. Thanks for the explanation and alert. I'm pleased that producers, performers, and/or their audience and media hypers have created an appropriate internal taxonomic label for the subgenre of Indo-electronica fusion.

"I just heard a remarkable new CD of this style, though I didn't notice 'Asian Massive' when skimming the notes. It is Qawwali-electronica fusion — remarkably effective, if uneven. It's People's Colony No. 1 by Temple of Sound and Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali.

"Similar fusion styles have been represented, notably by the great Nusrat Fatah Ali Khan (still mourned, one of the most remarkable musicians of the 20th century), Michael Brook, Sheila Chandra (a spectacular Indo-Brit vocal stylist), and U. Srinivas, a true phenomenon, a Carnatic classical mandolin virtuoso who started in Madras as a child prodigy. I wholeheartedly endorse your recommendation, and would consider any event including either Zakir Hussain or Sultan Khan worth attending."

Incidentally, a quarter-century ago, Prof. Lieberman presented a scholarly paper on the topic "Should Ethnomusicology be Abolished?" His resounding (but mostly tongue-in-cheek) yes to doing away with his own "pseudo-discipline" — a paper written before he had the safety of tenure — is still available at Abolishing ethnomusicology.

Mehta Supports Barenboim

Zubin Mehta called on the Israeli Knesset's Education Committee to reverse its decision to denounce Daniel Barenboim as a "cultural persona non grata in Israel" because of his performance of Wagner's music on July 7. Mehta, who himself has been trying to break the ban on Wagner, spoke in his capacity as music director of the Israel Philharmonic. "I discussed this issue with the orchestra's musicians and they also took the news very badly. You have to realize, Barenboim is a very loved person for this orchestra." Mehta said Barenboim is invited to conduct the Philharmonic next season.

New Violin Prodigy Phenom

Caitlin Tully, age 13, bested an international field of musicians of all ages to win first place in the Aspen Music Festival violin competition. The Vancouver prodigy won with a performance of the Shostakovich First Violin Concerto — the first Canadian and the youngest competitor to win the title. She told the Vancouver Sun, "It's not really for the winning, it's more for the performing, so it's really exciting when you win and it's not even in your mind as a possibility."

The daughter of University of British Columbia's Dean of Arts Alan Tully, Caitlin debuted with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra at the age of 10 and played as a soloist with the orchestra earlier this month, before going to Aspen. A violinist since the age of 4, she said she cannot imagine not playing the instrument that is the love of her life. She was offered a keyboard as a toddler, but when she wanted to pick it up and was told she could not, she refused to play it. "I insisted it was going to be violin, so then when I was 4, they got me an instrument and lessons and it just sort of went from there."

(Janos Gereben is arts editor of the Post Newspaper Group and technology editor for www.the451.com. You can contact him at janos451@earthlink.net.)

©2001 Janos Gereben, all rights reserved