Robert Commanday

Here’s to the Memories

We have many good memories of you and those tumultuous Adler years at San Francisco Opera. You were always honest and thoroughly candid. We suffered those annual luncheons together when Mr. A. had to make his “surprise” announcements of the forthcoming season. I recall your exasperation at the formality of the occasion, wondering, “Why can’t we just get an announcement and forgo all of this bull*?” It was a pleasure to work with you, recalling the glories of Sutherland and Sills, Domingo and Pavarotti, the big Ring Cycle (whose casting seems a dream now), and even that ill-fated Aida when anything could have happened … and, in fact, did. Many Happy Returns, Bob, from Lenox, Mass. I remember and honor you on your day. Peggy sends her greetings, as well.

— Dick Houdeck

Truth and Discovery

I recall my audition for Treble Clef in 1950. Millicent Hansen (Tomkins) and I sang the solo parts from L’Invitation d’uune Voyage of Duparc. You discovered me!! And then there were the years of reviewing my performances, sometimes favorable, sometimes not. But always honest.

I am glad that you are doing well. Making Music at the Bohemian Grove this year? Hi to Mary.

— Margot Helmuth Blum Schevill

A Guiding Force

It’s a pleasure to comment on Bob’s birthday, and I would like to spotlight his rock solid musical criticism at The San Francisco Chronicle, and for his creation of an independent, wide-ranging San Francisco Bay Area musical criticism vehicle (SFCV) following the demise of comprehensive musical newspaper criticism. Bob’s stature is surely equal to two of my friends, Albert Goldberg of The Los Angeles Times, and Harold Schonberg of the The New York Times. Bob always said in print what needed to be said, including supporting Frankenstein and detailing the foibles of the S.F. Symphony and S.F. Opera with their bloated budgets and husky endowments. I do not know the choral conducting that others describe below, but I know from numerous musicians that they particularly respected his expertise in choral music, solo cello, chamber music, and, of course, the rich treasures of the symphonic repertoire.

Bob’s establishing the SFCV was an exhilarating accomplishment, leading the way to continuing serious classical musical criticism from Monterey to Santa Rosa to Sacramento, outside of the conventional media. What a concept, and how well it has worked! In the North Bay, we have copied Bob’s groundbreaking work, and www.nbcm.org and currently www.classicalsonoma.org mirror his achievement for an online service to music.

Warm wishes to Robert Commanday for many more happy years.

— Terry McNeill
Concerts Grand

An Inspiration

We go back a long way in each other’s lives, don’t we, Bob? I was four or five months pregnant when I auditioned with you for the Oakland Chorus many decades ago, singing “Bist du bei mir.” You accepted me, and the rest is history.

Thank you for nudging me to write for the then newly formed SFCV, when I told you I wasn’t singing any more. I told you I wanted to try other things.

“What things?” you asked.

“Oh, maybe writing,” I said.

You told me how to write reviews, guided me through my many mistakes, and made me a better writer. So today, I send you abundant heartfelt wishes for your birthday and for many happy returns of same. May you enjoy them in good health and good spirits.

— Stephanie Friedman

Dressed for the Opera, with Jemmie

Quick Wishes

Congratulations on the day and here’s to many more! Your contributions to San Francisco’s musical scene are numerous and much appreciated by all.

— Kary Shulman
Director
Grants for the Arts

— Widgie Hastings

— Martin Bernheimer

Musical Gifts

Happy Birthday Robert Commanday! What would you like? The Stravinsky version of the standard greeting, or one, I believe, by Nicholas Slonimsky? Myself, I’d prefer the Bruckner 3rd Symphony played by the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra under the baton of Kurt Masur.

— Ruth C. Jacobs

P.S. I am really enjoying volunteering in the Opera’s communications department on Monday afternoons with your delightful granddaughter Elisabeth Swim; I attended a concert in Davies Hall and it was fascinating because you look so much alike!

Toasting You From Turkey

Greetings from sunny Istanbul, Turkey, where I am a music journalist with Time Out magazine. I’m also teaching music at the Conservatoire inside the French Consulate here. Believe me, at a time when arts journalists are getting the axe in the U.S., I feel very fortunate to have an editor here who says, literally, “write whatever you want.” And I do.

I see on SFCV it’s your B-Day, so I take this occasion to renew my contact with you and let you know I still read the Web site every week. It’s a wonderful service to the Bay Area’s rich performing arts world, the artists, and a model for arts journalism around the world.

I hope your birthday today is wonderful, full of friends, and some great music!

Best wishes.

— Alexandra Ivanoff
Time Out Istanbul

Counducting on a Japan reunion tour

To 86 More …

I wanted to add my birthday greetings and good wishes to all the others that will no doubt come flooding in for your 86th! Not only are you fondly remembered by those of us who “knew you when,” but it is delightful having your granddaughter working at San Francisco Opera. Elisabeth’s work-space, and that of her colleague, Micah, are one of the many places in the WMOH where I worked when I was producing the radio broadcasts during the 1970’s.

Be well, and enjoy your longevity!

— Marilyn Mercur

Thanks for Writing

Happy Birthday, and may you have many more healthy years of listening to and writing about music!

And a belated thank you, for letting me write for SFCV.
Yours gratefully,

— Lisa Hirsch

Singing Your Praises

I sang in the Oakland Symphony Chorus in 1997 (or 1998?) when you directed us for two movements of the Mozart Requiem. OSC was commemorating its 40th anniversary and had invited all previous directors to attend and you showed up! I recall talking to you at the reception after and you mentioning this new endeavor, the San Francisco Classical Voice, an attempt to bring professional-level music criticism to cyberspace (still quite new then).

And you succeeded! I still cannot miss each weekly edition and am so impressed with the stable of critics and how much I learn about classical music and musicians from SFCV.

And for those of you SFCV‘ers out there who would like to perform (again?) under Bob’s baton, the OSC will feature him July 29 at the Summer Sing-ins for the Brahms Requiem. NOT to be missed!

Thanks again, Bob, for your continued support of Bay Area classical music. And Happy Birthday!

— Marc Lambert

Writing Muse

Congratulations on your birthday from an old frend and admirer. I’ve been out of music criticism quite a while, and only recently returned to arts writing after a long stint in new media management. It was at the MCANA convention recently in Denver that I learned your birthday was coming up. You were president of the MCA when I first began working as a critic and you were helpful in so many different ways — getting me into an early writers’ workshop at Ravinia was important early on.

What I now see on your site is indeed impressive, obviously the result of steady nurturing over many years, and I can see that you are continuing to cultivate writers. Congratulations to a life well managed and many good choices.

All the best to you always,

— Nancy Malitz

Want to write a tribute?

Send an e-mail to editor@sfcv.org.

Robert Commanday

Musical Gifts

Happy Birthday Robert Commanday! What would you like? The Stravinsky version of the standard greeting, or one, I believe, by Nicholas Slonimsky? Myself, I’d prefer the Bruckner 3rd Symphony played by the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra under the baton of Kurt Masur.

— Ruth C. Jacobs

P.S. I am really enjoying volunteering in the Opera’s communications department on Monday afternoons with your delightful granddaughter Elisabeth Swim; I attended a concert in Davies Hall and it was fascinating because you look so much alike!

Dressed for the Opera, with Jemmie

Toasting You From Turkey

Greetings from sunny Istanbul, Turkey, where I am a music journalist with Time Out magazine. I’m also teaching music at the Conservatoire inside the French Consulate here. Believe me, at a time when arts journalists are getting the axe in the U.S., I feel very fortunate to have an editor here who says, literally, “write whatever you want.” And I do.

I see on SFCV it’s your B-Day, so I take this occasion to renew my contact with you and let you know I still read the Web site every week. It’s a wonderful service to the Bay Area’s rich performing arts world, the artists, and a model for arts journalism around the world.

I hope your birthday today is wonderful, full of friends, and some great music!

Best wishes.

— Alexandra Ivanoff
Time Out Istanbul

Counducting on a Japan reunion tour

To 86 More …

I wanted to add my birthday greetings and good wishes to all the others that will no doubt come flooding in for your 86th! Not only are you fondly remembered by those of us who “knew you when,” but it is delightful having your granddaughter working at San Francisco Opera. Elisabeth’s work-space, and that of her colleague, Micah, are one of the many places in the WMOH where I worked when I was producing the radio broadcasts during the 1970’s.

Be well, and enjoy your longevity!

— Marilyn Mercur

Thanks for Writing

Happy Birthday, and may you have many more healthy years of listening to and writing about music!

And a belated thank you, for letting me write for SFCV.
Yours gratefully,

— Lisa Hirsch

Singing Your Praises

I sang in the Oakland Symphony Chorus in 1997 (or 1998?) when you directed us for two movements of the Mozart Requiem. OSC was commemorating its 40th anniversary and had invited all previous directors to attend and you showed up! I recall talking to you at the reception after and you mentioning this new endeavor, the San Francisco Classical Voice, an attempt to bring professional-level music criticism to cyberspace (still quite new then).

And you succeeded! I still cannot miss each weekly edition and am so impressed with the stable of critics and how much I learn about classical music and musicians from SFCV.

And for those of you SFCV‘ers out there who would like to perform (again?) under Bob’s baton, the OSC will feature him July 29 at the Summer Sing-ins for the Brahms Requiem. NOT to be missed!

Thanks again, Bob, for your continued support of Bay Area classical music. And Happy Birthday!

— Marc Lambert

Writing Muse

Congratulations on your birthday from an old frend and admirer. I’ve been out of music criticism quite a while, and only recently returned to arts writing after a long stint in new media management. It was at the MCANA convention recently in Denver that I learned your birthday was coming up. You were president of the MCA when I first began working as a critic and you were helpful in so many different ways — getting me into an early writers’ workshop at Ravinia was important early on.

What I now see on your site is indeed impressive, obviously the result of steady nurturing over many years, and I can see that you are continuing to cultivate writers. Congratulations to a life well managed and many good choices.

All the best to you always,

— Nancy Malitz

Want to write a tribute?

Send an e-mail to editor@sfcv.org.

Robert Commanday

Musical Gifts

Happy Birthday Robert Commanday! What would you like? The Stravinsky version of the standard greeting, or one, I believe, by Nicholas Slonimsky? Myself, I’d prefer the Bruckner 3rd Symphony played by the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra under the baton of Kurt Masur.

— Ruth C. Jacobs

P.S. I am really enjoying volunteering in the Opera’s communications department on Monday afternoons with your delightful granddaughter Elisabeth Swim; I attended a concert in Davies Hall and it was fascinating because you look so much alike!

Dressed for the Opera, with Jemmie

Toasting You From Turkey

Greetings from sunny Istanbul, Turkey, where I am a music journalist with Time Out magazine. I’m also teaching music at the Conservatoire inside the French Consulate here. Believe me, at a time when arts journalists are getting the axe in the U.S., I feel very fortunate to have an editor here who says, literally, “write whatever you want.” And I do.

I see on SFCV it’s your B-Day, so I take this occasion to renew my contact with you and let you know I still read the Web site every week. It’s a wonderful service to the Bay Area’s rich performing arts world, the artists, and a model for arts journalism around the world.

I hope your birthday today is wonderful, full of friends, and some great music!

Best wishes.

— Alexandra Ivanoff
Time Out Istanbul

Counducting on a Japan reunion tour

To 86 More …

I wanted to add my birthday greetings and good wishes to all the others that will no doubt come flooding in for your 86th! Not only are you fondly remembered by those of us who “knew you when,” but it is delightful having your granddaughter working at San Francisco Opera. Elisabeth’s work-space, and that of her colleague, Micah, are one of the many places in the WMOH where I worked when I was producing the radio broadcasts during the 1970’s.

Be well, and enjoy your longevity!

— Marilyn Mercur

Thanks for Writing

Happy Birthday, and may you have many more healthy years of listening to and writing about music!

And a belated thank you, for letting me write for SFCV.
Yours gratefully,

— Lisa Hirsch

Singing Your Praises

I sang in the Oakland Symphony Chorus in 1997 (or 1998?) when you directed us for two movements of the Mozart Requiem. OSC was commemorating its 40th anniversary and had invited all previous directors to attend and you showed up! I recall talking to you at the reception after and you mentioning this new endeavor, the San Francisco Classical Voice, an attempt to bring professional-level music criticism to cyberspace (still quite new then).

And you succeeded! I still cannot miss each weekly edition and am so impressed with the stable of critics and how much I learn about classical music and musicians from SFCV.

And for those of you SFCV‘ers out there who would like to perform (again?) under Bob’s baton, the OSC will feature him July 29 at the Summer Sing-ins for the Brahms Requiem. NOT to be missed!

Thanks again, Bob, for your continued support of Bay Area classical music. And Happy Birthday!

— Marc Lambert

Writing Muse

Congratulations on your birthday from an old frend and admirer. I’ve been out of music criticism quite a while, and only recently returned to arts writing after a long stint in new media management. It was at the MCANA convention recently in Denver that I learned your birthday was coming up. You were president of the MCA when I first began working as a critic and you were helpful in so many different ways — getting me into an early writers’ workshop at Ravinia was important early on.

What I now see on your site is indeed impressive, obviously the result of steady nurturing over many years, and I can see that you are continuing to cultivate writers. Congratulations to a life well managed and many good choices.

All the best to you always,

— Nancy Malitz

Want to write a tribute?

Send an e-mail to editor@sfcv.org.

Gerhard Samuel

For readers who were not here during his tenure, 1959 1971, it should be told that he quickly turned the Oakland Symphony into a fully professional orchestra of superior quality, able to deliver first class performances of the best and the most challenging orchestra repertory. He was a very good conductor, not inspirational with the super qualities that set the great ones apart, but he was a solid musician, and a sound craftsman, who would forge fine, unified performances, demanding the best without ever being severe, harsh, temperamental, or overbearing.

Unlike the other regional orchestras, with the exception of the former San Jose Symphony, his Oakland Symphony did not depend upon individual ringers drawn from other communities, but had its own full complement of musicians under contract. It was, in fact, a source of ringers for other ensembles, and a major reservoir of talent for chamber music and other classical music needs throughout the area. Indeed, Samuel’s Oakland Symphony served as the San Francisco Ballet’s orchestra for two or three years (he was also the Ballet’s music director).

In a typical season (1965 1966), the orchestra played six pairs of concerts and one triple on its regular subscription, eight concerts that were run outs to communities as far off as Davis and Stanford, six separate chamber orchestra concerts, and two youth programs. Samuel’s artistic and imaginative programming was all important in drawing a solid and devoted following to the Oakland Auditorium Theater (subsequently renamed the Calvin Simmons Theater, and later closed). That was a finer orchestral hall than any in the Bay Area, then and now. Yes, it wasn’t beautiful, the seats were of wood and the lobby and hallways were confining and hardly elegant, but the acoustics and the proximity of every listener to the stage were unequaled. You were immersed in the orchestral sound, psychologically within it. That was a big force in helping transform new and inexperienced listeners into devotees, and into music lovers.

As for the programming, Gary, the name by which everyone addressed him, had a deep curiosity for the literature. A composer himself, he found and performed overlooked important works by the most well known and also by the greatly respected but ignored composers. Unlike most of his colleagues then and since, he did not glorify the music of the Soviet Union at the expense of 20th century American composers. Quite the contrary. He played a higher proportion of 20th century and contemporary music than most, but placed these works selectively, premiere after premiere, including local first performances of modern classics.

The new pieces benefited from the effects of the repertory works surrounding them — and in turn, the interplay heightened perception of the classical and romantic pieces. He also presented major artists in his seasons, artists that were at the top and appearing with the leading orchestras, as well as outstanding artists of the next generation who were major in every way except perhaps celebrity. He did the major choral works, even Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, rarely attempted by regional orchestras, and it was memorable.

Gary introduced many major works to the Bay Area, and was the first to perform Charles Ives’ Fourth Symphony, Alban Berg’s Lyric Suite, and Stravinsky’s Persephone, just three examples that come to mind. At his Cabrillo Festival, with its orchestra drawn from the Oakland Symphony, he gave the first West Coast performances of Mozart’s Idomeneo, Rameau’s opera Hyppolyte et Aricie, the great Swiss composer Frank Martin’s Le vin herbé, Haydn’s Orpheus and Eurydice, and Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito long before it came to the San Francisco Opera’s Spring Opera.

As a result, Samuel and his orchestra created a great and devoted following, a big percentage of it from Berkeley and UC Berkeley. When the fortunes of the Oakland Symphony declined much later, and after its bankruptcy, much of that audience turned to the Berkeley Symphony as it gradually was professionalized. Samuel’s Oakland Symphony benefited from the low estate into which the San Francisco Symphony had declined during this period, under the leadership of Enrique Jorda.

The comparison in terms of energy and excitement was embarrassing. This led the president of the San Francisco Symphony, the late J.D. Zellerbach, who was chiefly responsible for the appointment of Jorda (and more regrettably, the renewal of his contract), to try and eliminate the Oakland Symphony and draw its board and patrons to his side (specifically for the contributed income). The deal he cut collapsed on the eve of its consummation with the heart attack that felled the Oakland Symphony’s president.

Nevertheless, some of the less musically aware Oakland board members kept sniping at Samuel, principally because of the occasional unfamiliar work that was performed. One self-important East Bay executive got on Samuel’s case because Gary wasn’t hiring as many of the world’s most famous artists (from the glamorous and prohibitively expensive short list of soloists that that man had heard of ) and “was not playing enough Mozart” (which was of course untrue).

Push came to shove and Samuel, a man of high principle, shoved off, first for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as associate conductor, later for a post on the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music faculty. Meanwhile he was considerably involved composing music, eventually settling into a position teaching composition at the University of Washington. It is more than sad that he is only recalled publicly just now, in memoriam. Regional orchestra associations have notoriously short memories and their current directors have a misguided self interest in neglecting the recognition of their predecessors.

It is unlikely that the historical materials pertaining to the original Oakland Symphony are properly preserved and available and so I am turning my saved programs and clippings over to the Museum of Performance and Design (the former PALM). It would be a good contribution if other former colleagues (the players) and patrons were to do the same, in memory of a distinguished musician — one who earned a place in the Bay Area’s pantheon of artists.

David Milnes, a colleague at UC Berkeley, was preparing to premiere one of the composer’s latest pieces, Furthermore … (2006), with the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, when the news came. At the SFCMP concert on Monday (see review), Milnes spoke briefly to the audience, referring to the group’s Contemporary Insights event the day before in San Francisco: “Imagine our shock at a salon [Sunday] afternoon, where we were to share the piece with others, and we got the terrible news instead. Last week at rehearsals he was upbeat. There was not a hint of melancholy. We had no hints of what was to come. It’s a terrible artistic loss. His output is now closed, but his music will live on.”

Jorge Liderman

Liderman was an exceptionally sensitive and careful musician, and his compositions were marked, like his personality, with a generosity of spirit and humility. There was no technical display of learning or excess complexity. He composed intuitively, by ear, without espousing a particular style or school.

Liderman’s death comes at a time when a raft of new recordings (seven in the past three years and a new one about to be released on Bridge records), a 50th birthday concert through Cal Performances (see review), a 2003 Guggenheim grant, and numerous new commissions were beginning to broaden his base of popularity to match the imagination and accessibility of his music. (You can listen to samples at his Web site.) For a composer who had decried the “ghetto of composers writing music for other composers,” it would have been a time to be savored.

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Liderman studied music in Israel; Mark Kopitman was his teacher at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem. Meeting composer Shulamit Ran in Tel Aviv, he subsequently studied with her and Ralph Shapey at the University of Chicago, before being hired by UC Berkeley in 1989. He was internationally recognized, to a degree, and his music received performances from the London Sinfonietta, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Arditti Quartet, and the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, among others, and at festivals like Darmstadt (Germany), Foro Internacional (Mexico), and Nuova Consonanza (Italy). His opera, Antigona furiosa (1991), was performed at the 1992 Munich Biennale. And he had numerous prominent performances in the Bay Area during the 20 years of his residency.

It can be difficult to define originality or “voice” in a creative personality when it doesn’t reside in overt acts of revolution, or in polemical, theoretical pronouncements. Liderman in particular wasn’t given to those modes of expression. His music is not minimalist-influenced, or eclectically postmodern. It isn’t easy to pigeonhole, but it is compelling. It bursts with vitality, the music flowing out in an irresistible stream.

If you listen to Waking Dances, the first piece he wrote for guitarist David Tanenbaum (and recorded by him on Bridge Records), you’ll note the incredibly simple materials he begins with. A scale fragment, a three-note ostinato, a few scattered pitches transmogrify into extraordinary structures through the composer’s fantasy. As Ran, his teacher and friend, put it simply, the sources of inspiration were almost “primeval,” but were developed by “a sophisticated mind that allowed the elements to flourish into something unique and elaborate.” The mind, what she calls “rigor,” contributes as much to the music’s surging quality as the rhythmic bounce and drive.

Of course there are always influences on a composer, and if you search long enough, you’ll find them. Liderman can count a number of teachers and famous musicians who contributed to his sense of style, including Kopitman, Ran, Hans Werner Henze, György Ligeti, and, behind them all, Stravinsky. But again, you won’t pick those personalities out easily.

Tanenbaum relates that, when he was rehearsing Swirling Streams, commissioned by the guitarist and scored for the unusual combination of guitar, string trio and bass clarinet, “We just coincidentally found out that Henze had written a piece for guitar, bassoon, and string trio, and so we did them on the same program.” But the connection pretty much ends there. Among other things, “Jorge’s has much more rhythmic vitality and pulse than Henze’s does,” he says. Tanenbaum points to Ligeti as the influence on Liderman’s individual sense of rhythm.

And yet, as Ran reminded me, “The rich tapestry that was his life, being raised in Argentina, and then growing up in Israel, and then coming to this country and then the West Coast, and growing new roots — I think all of those, in various ways, were reflected in his music, but not in a thoughtless, eclectic way. The music reflected the life that he led.” You look to life influences to explain the texts he chose to set, for example in the Aires de Sefarad (2001), or the oratoriolike Song of Songs (2004), or the Shir ha Sharim (1986), based on the Book of Solomon, all works that reflected his interest in Jewish culture.

A Generous Spirit, Always Searching

It took a residency on the West Coast, however, to provide him with an outlet to investigate the guitar, that iconic instrument of Latin America. “He came to me — it was about 10 years ago,” says Tanenbaum. “He knew my work and presented himself as really blocked with the guitar. He knew it and had always wanted to write for it, but he couldn’t get there. And he said, ‘I want you to help me get over the hump.’ So we worked quite a bit — of the four major pieces we ended up doing together, the one we went back and forth on the most was the first one [Waking Dances]. It was more of a struggle for him [than the others].”

The fluidity of the completed work betrays none of that struggle, naturally, but the story points to an aspect of Liderman’s view of music. He enjoyed taking artistic risks and thought it was a necessary part of creativity. Ran notes that he rarely looked back. “Sometimes, when I would mention his opera, which is a piece I just love, he would say to me, ‘Oh that’s an old piece, already.’ He was always looking for new ways of thinking about music, always working things out in his mind. He had the powerful stamp of his own personality, but at the same time, he was always searching, always open for more.”

As a colleague and friend, Liderman was one of the more generous people you could hope to meet. He was humble, deflecting conversation away from his own music to that of other composers. His graduate students benefited from being treated as equals from the beginning, and also from his incredibly detailed and thoughtful recommendations.

Robert Cole, a friend and director of Cal Performances, says, “He was helpful in practical ways, making things easy that would otherwise be very difficult to do.” Cole points to Cal Performances’ Edge Festival in 2005, when instead of featuring his own compositions, Liderman suggested that the performances focus on his former students. “We brought some Berkeley graduates back, but it was only possible because Jorge made it happen.”

Bonnie Wade, the chairperson of the UC Berkeley music department, knew him as a quiet and humble man, dedicated to teaching. “At both the graduate and the undergraduate level, he was somebody who had the door open, literally. He would be in the department for many hours, with the door open for students who wanted to come [talk] on a one-to-one basis.”

Personal memories of Liderman paint the opposite picture of a man struggling with depression. Ran recalls her first meeting with the young man in Tel Aviv: “He came to see me at our apartment and I still remember he warmed my heart immediately. There was something so engaging and bright and open about him, and we had a wonderful conversation.”

As a former Ph.D. student in the department, I recall him ambling through the halls of UC Berkeley, saying hello to his students in an amiable, totally unpatronizing way. He made real contact with them. He bicycled everywhere, and Tanenbaum recalls conversations held while riding. “He would be so involved in conversation — he’d be in the middle of the street and turning his head backward to say something to me, like old Mr. Magoo or something, and I was worried that something would happen to him, but it never did.”

Wade relates that “he loved to cook. He gave parties that always collected the most interesting, unconnected people from the various parts of his life.” The department plans a moment of silence on Tuesday afternoon at 3 p.m. for the composer.

Liderman is survived by his wife, Mimi, of El Cerrito, and his mother, Sarah, and sister, Claudia, both of Buenos Aires. Plans for a memorial service have not yet been announced.

Andrew Imbrie

He had composed a great corpus of music, works in all of the principal genres, including two operas. One of these, Angle of Repose, based on the late Wallace Stegner’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, commissioned and performed in 1976 by the San Francisco Opera, received national acclaim. He wrote symphonies and concertos that were performed here by the San Francisco and Oakland Symphonies.

Composing was his life, occupying him almost exclusively. He never stopped, even in this year completing four works, though his health had been failing for some time. The last complete one, Sextet for Six Friends, introduced by the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble in San Francisco, Mill Valley, and Sonoma last February, was remarkably direct and clear. It was one of the more immediately engaging of all his works. Early next year, a clarinet quintet’s first movement that he finished last month will be played in Boston by Richard Stoltzman and the Borromeo String Quartet.

His music is unique and individual, independent of any trend, current, or school, recognized by its very personal, often passionate expressiveness and the underlying vocal nature of his melodic impulse. What controls and guides the forces of Imbrie’s music is first a dialectic process, the musical idea generating both its own continuity and its contrasting response, and second his grasp of the whole, a vision of the music’s destiny. At the highest level of integrity, it has always reflected masterful craftsmanship.

Elliott Carter, America’s most eminent composer, recalls that Imbrie “was a wonderful composer, wrote beautiful, elegant, and sensitive music. I liked him very much personally. He was an absolutely most interesting, amusing, and profound man.” The composer Wayne Peterson describes him as “a completely honest and for many years, the leading composer in the Bay Area. His work has had a great influence on my own music and many people had been influenced by him. He had lived a great life.” Alan Rich, a prominent music critic in Los Angeles, writes, “Most of my awareness of new music and its struggles for existence I owe to Andrew in my Berkeley years: the strengths in his music — the quartets, the Violin Concerto, that spacious and glorious opera — and the strengths in the way he could argue music’s cause. It made me proud to know him, and it still does.”

A Rich Life

Imbrie was born in New York City in 1921, and raised in Princeton, N.J. He graduated from Princeton University. He developed great skill and fluency at the keyboard through early training as a pianist with noted teachers Pauline and Leo Ornstein, Olga Samaroff, Rosalyn Tureck, and Robert Casadesus. Composition supplanted piano as a career aspiration after a summer studying with Nadia Boulanger in Fontainebleau, France, while working with Roger Sessions, his major teacher and inspiration both during his Princeton years and later at UC Berkeley, where he earned his master’s degree.

Before that he served in the U.S. Army as a cryptanalytic translator of Japanese and immediately after, spent two years composing while a resident of the American Academy in Rome. His career had already been launched in 1947 when his senior thesis at Princeton, the first of five string quartets he was to compose, was awarded the New York Critics’ Award and recorded by the Juilliard Quartet.

Imbrie joined the faculty of the UC Berkeley music department in 1949, teaching there until his retirement in 1991. He also taught at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, at Brandeis University and after 1991, at the Universities of Chicago, Alabama, and British Columbia, at Harvard, New York, and Northwestern Universities, the Sand Point Music Festival, and as composer-in-residence at the Tanglewood Music Center. He was given the Alice M. Ditson Award (1947), the National Institute of Arts and Letters Grant (1950), the Boston Symphony Merit Award and Brandeis Creative Arts Award (1957), two Guggenheim Fellowships (1953, 1959), the Walter Hinrichsen Award (1971), and UC Berkeley’s Berkeley Citation (1991).

His commissions include those from the New York Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony and Opera, the Pro Arte Quartet, Francesco Trio, Ford and Naumburg Foundations, and the Halle Orchestra. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters (from 1969) and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (since 1980) and served on the board of the Koussevitzky Foundation.

His compositions ranged widely in genre, and included three symphonies, eight concertos, many songs, sonatas, chamber works for diverse instrumental combinations, and choral compositions that revealed his unerring and sensitive ear for the chorus as a complex and human instrument — five that were major works with orchestra. Notable were Drumtaps (to Whitman), Prometheus Bound (to Greene after Aeschylus), and Adam (to medieval and Civil War texts), commissioned and performed in 1994 by Boston’s Cantata Singers. It was praised by Boston Globe music critic Richard Dyer as a “fully achieved and masterly work” and in a musical language “infinitely resourceful and responsive.” The grandest and most moving of these choral works was the Requiem (1984), in memory of his youngest son, John, which set elements of traditional liturgy reflected on in poems by Blake, George Herbert, and Donne.

Imbrie is survived by his wife, Barbara, and his son Andrew Philip, of Santa Clara. The funeral services will be at St. Clement’s Church in Berkeley (2837 Claremont Blvd.) at 4 p.m on Dec. 12.

Assuming knowledge that the San Francisco Symphony is offering Messiah (at Davies Hall, Dec. 21-23) and Colors of Christmas (Dec. 18-20), that the Ballet is doing Nutcracker (Opera House, Dec. 13–30), that Cal Performances has Mark Morris’ Hard Nut (Dec. 14-23), and that ACT is filling Geary Theater wall to wall with A Christmas Carol (Dec. 5-23), let us explore more unusual examples of holiday entertainment.

Philharmonia Baroque

Highlighting 17th-century German sacred music, Philharmonia Baroque is featuring Heinrich Schütz’ Weihnachtshistorie (Christmas story), as well as works by Johann Rosenmüller and Johann Kuhnau. The guest conductor is the famed lutenist virtuoso Konrad Junghänel (see review).

Dec. 12, 8 p.m., Lafayette-Orinda Presbyterian Church; Dec. 14, 8 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco; $30-$72, (415) 252-1288, www.philharmonia.org.

Konrad Junghänel

Reveling in Christmas

A clown’s holiday memories are offered by Geoff Hoyle in “The Christmas Revels,” a trip through the English countryside with the story of a “Songcatcher,” who collects the songs, dances, and village traditions that mark the turning of the year. Hoyle’s characters include church wardens, farmers, pub keepers, and itinerant music hall performers, who carry on traditions of the Abbots Bromley Stag Horn Dance and the Sussex Mummers Carol, among many others.

Dec. 14, 7:30 p.m., Dec. 15-16, 1 p.m. and 5 p.m., Scottish Rite Theater, Oakland, $15-$50, (510) 452-8800; www.calrevels.org.

Schola Cantorum S.F.

The highly skilled singers of Schola Cantorum San Francisco, under the direction of Paul Flight, turn their attention to Tomás Luis de Victoria’s masterpiece, the Missa O magnum mysterium, which is based on his famous Christmas motet. More Renaissance magic awaits in the second half of the San Francisco Early Music Society concert, featuring music by Thomas Tallis, William Byrd, Jean Mouton, and Orlando di Lasso.

Dec. 14, 8 p.m., First Lutheran Church, Palo Alto; Dec. 15, 8 p.m., First Congregational Church, Berkeley; Dec. 16, 3:30 p.m., St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church, San Francisco; $25, (510) 528-1725, www.sfems.org.

Peninsula Women’s Chorus

Also on a road less traveled, but more cheerful, Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols is at the center of the concert that opens the Peninsula Women’s Chorus’ 41st season. Besides Britten’s use of plainsong and carols originating in the 15th century, the program includes choral works by Kodály, Jasinski, Olsson, and Pablo Casals. The work by the great cellist is Nigra Sum, with a lush base line that mimics a rich cello line, a sensual soprano line, and some beautiful sixths. The piece celebrates the beauty of being black.

Dec. 16, 3 p.m., Mission Santa Clara, Santa Clara University, $15-$18, (650) 327-3095, www.pwchorus.org.

Ragazzi Is 20

“Twenty Decembers” is the title of the program and a matter of pride for the Ragazzi Boys Chorus, celebrating its 20th season and holiday concert. The program spans 10 centuries of music, from medieval chant to a 20th-century Ave Maria by Franz Biebl.

Dec. 16, 5 p.m., First Congregational Church, Palo Alto; $10-$25, (650) 342-8731, www.ragazzi.org.

The Boys of Ragazzi

A Prodigy and a Mayor

Unusual is definitely the word for the combination of 11-year-old cellist Clark Pang playing music by Bach and former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown acting as narrator in Chamber Music San Francisco’s Classical Christmas Special. Brown’s participation is in a new ballet setting of O. Henry’s Gift of the Magi, choreographed by Arturo Fernandez, and featuring dancer Maurya Kerr. Former San Francisco Opera Center singers Kristin Clayton and Bojan Knezevic will also perform.

Dec. 23, 2 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco, $10-$40, (415) 392-4500, www.cityboxoffice.com.

Clark Pang

Assuming knowledge that the San Francisco Symphony is offering Messiah (at Davies Hall, Dec. 21-23) and Colors of Christmas (Dec. 18-20), that the Ballet is doing Nutcracker (Opera House, Dec. 13–30), that Cal Performances has Mark Morris’ Hard Nut (Dec. 14-23), and that ACT is filling Geary Theater wall to wall with A Christmas Carol (Dec. 5-23), let us explore more unusual examples of holiday entertainment.

Cypress String Quartet Gets Dark

It doesn’t get any more offbeat than San Francisco’s Cypress String Quartet and its “Noir Christmas,” featuring Béla Bartók’s brooding 1939 String Quartet No. 6, interwoven with spoken word by Peter Plate and Robert Mailer Anderson.

Dec. 5, 7:30 p.m., Villa Montalvo, Saratoga, $30, (408) 961-5858, www.montalvoarts.org.

Cypress String Quartet

Reveling in Christmas

A clown’s holiday memories are offered by Geoff Hoyle in “The Christmas Revels,” a trip through the English countryside with the story of a “Songcatcher,” who collects the songs, dances, and village traditions that mark the turning of the year. Hoyle’s characters include church wardens, farmers, pub keepers, and itinerant music hall performers, who carry on traditions of the Abbots Bromley Stag Horn Dance and the Sussex Mummers Carol, among many others.

Dec. 7 and 14, 7:30 p.m.; Dec. 8-9, Dec. 15-16, 1 and 5 p.m.; Scottish Rite Theater, Oakland, $15-$50, (510) 452-8800; www.calrevels.org.

Philharmonia Baroque

Highlighting 17th-century German sacred music, Philharmonia Baroque is featuring Heinrich Schütz’ Weihnachtshistorie (Christmas Story), as well as works by Johann Rosenmüller and Johann Kuhnau. The guest conductor is the famed lutenist virtuoso Konrad Junghänel.

Dec. 7, 8 p.m., First United Methodist Church, Palo Alto; Dec. 8, 8 p.m., Dec. 9, 7:30 p.m., First Congregational Church, Berkeley; Dec. 12, 8 p.m., Lafayette-Orinda Presbyterian Church; Dec. 14, 8 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco; $30-$72, (415) 252-1288, www.philharmonia.org.

Konrad Junghänel

Peninsula Women’s Chorus

Also on a road less traveled, but more cheerful, Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols is at the center of the concert that opens the Peninsula Women’s Chorus’ 41st season. Besides Britten’s use of plainsong and carols originating in the 15th century, the program includes choral works by Kodály, Jasinski, Olsson, and Pablo Casals. The work by the great cellist is Nigra Sum, with a lush base line that mimics a rich cello line, a sensual soprano line, and some beautiful sixths. The piece celebrates the beauty of being black.

Dec. 8, 8 p.m.; and Dec. 9, 4 p.m.; St. Patrick’s Seminary, Menlo Park; Dec. 16, 3 p.m., Mission Santa Clara, Santa Clara University, $15-$18, (650) 327-3095, www.pwchorus.org.

Ragazzi Is 20

“Twenty Decembers” is the title of the program and a matter of pride for the Ragazzi Boys Chorus, celebrating its 20th season and holiday concert. The program spans 10 centuries of music, from medieval chant to a 20th-century Ave Maria by Franz Biebl.

Dec. 8, 4 p.m., Old First Church, San Francisco; Dec. 9, 5 p.m., St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church, San Mateo; Dec. 16, 5 p.m., First Congregational Church, Palo Alto; $10-$25, (650) 342-8731, www.ragazzi.org.

The Boys of Ragazzi

Magnificat

If you can’t make opera, make cantatas. The Bay Area ensemble that celebrates 17th-century music welcomes soprano Catherine Webster for a “Roman Christmas.” It may have been criminal for Pope Innocent to ban opera in Rome, but it resulted in a wealth of sacred oratorios and cantatas composed by Alessandro Scarlatti. His Christmas cantatas, as well as Corelli’s Christmas Christmas concerto, are joined by works by other Roman composers.

Dec. 7, 8 p.m., First Lutheran Church, Palo Alto; Dec. 8, 8 p.m., St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Berkeley; Dec. 9, 4 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, San Francisco; $12-$28, (415) 979-4500, www.magnificatbaroque.org.

Just Don’t Call It Opera

The group Operafest is a children’s chorus from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, that apparently has little or nothing to do with opera. At any rate, the chorus will join the Piedmont Choirs, under Robert Geary’s direction, in a candlelight concert at Old First Church, performing “holiday music from around the world.”

Dec. 9, 4 p.m., Old First Church, San Francisco, $12-$15, (415) 474-1608, www.oldfirstconcerts.org.

Operafest

A Spectrum at the S.F. Conservatory

A Musical Spectrum by two composers with the San Francisco Conservatory of Music is offered in the Faculty Artists Series. Alden Jenks presents works written on computers and synthesizers in the school’s electronic music studio; Mikako Endo’s work includes “music for jazz combo, music for kids, jazz for kids, songs for grown-ups, two-piano music for J.S. Bach, country music for your broken heart, and one or two surprises for fun.”

Dec. 10, 8 p.m., San Francisco Conservatory Recital Hall, $15-$20, (415) 503-6275, www.sfcm.edu.

Schola Cantorum SF

The highly skilled singers of Schola Cantorum San Francisco, under the direction of Paul Flight, turn their attention to Tomás Luis de Victoria’s masterpiece, the Missa O magnum mysterium, which is based on his famous Christmas motet. More Renaissance magic awaits in the second half of the San Francisco Early Music Society concert, featuring music by Thomas Tallis, William Byrd, Jean Mouton, and Orlando di Lasso.

Dec. 14, 8 p.m., First Lutheran Church, Palo Alto; Dec. 15, 8 p.m., First Congregational Church, Berkeley; Dec. 16, 3:30 p.m., St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church, San Francisco; $25, (510) 528-1725, www.sfems.org.

A Prodigy and a Mayor

Unusual is definitely the word for the combination of 11-year-old cellist Clark Pang playing music by Bach and former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown acting as narrator in Chamber Music San Francisco’s Classical Christmas Special. Brown’s participation is in a new ballet setting of O. Henry’s Gift of the Magi, choreographed by Arturo Fernandez, and featuring dancer Maurya Kerr. Former San Francisco Opera Center singers Kristin Clayton and Bojan Knezevic will also perform.

Dec. 23, 2 p.m., Herbst Theatre, San Francisco, $10-$40, (415) 392-4500, www.cityboxoffice.com.

Clark Pang

Born in the Bronx, New York, he moved to San Francisco with his family in 1938, graduated from Lowell High School in 1947, and UC Berkeley, which he entered at age 16. In 1953, Sunshine, who was active in San Francisco as a cellist and pianist, conducted the first concert of what was to become the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, in 1957. He studied conducting with Pierre Monteux at his school in Hancock, Maine, and with Leonard Bernstein at Tanglewood. In 1958, Sunshine left for Europe, where after three years of study on scholarship, he was appointed music director of Lisbon’s Gulbenkian Orchestra, and following that, principal guest conductor, in Romania (1971-1982), and of the Athens State Orchestra (1988 to 1994). He also had conducting engagements with the English Chamber Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and the Leningrad Philharmonic.

Meanwhile, in 1979, he had founded the London Chamber Players, and with that chamber orchestra he toured Europe, South America, East Asia, South Africa, Egypt (performing at the opening of the new Alexandria Library in 2003), Russia, Poland, and repeatedly in Spain. His London Chamber Players was the first orchestra to tour the South African townships, postapartheid, and in 2003 he gave concerts attended by the Rev. Desmond Tutu. Sunshine hosted concerts where the children in the townships participated, playing alongside the orchestra’s musicians, and arranged for instruments to be left there so that they could continue to study.

His was one of the more peripatetic careers, which included performances in 41 countries; performances and master classes in Beijing; visiting professorships at the Romanian Academy of Music, Smith College, Bowling Green State University, Ohio, the Conservatoire National in Reims, France, and the University of London’s Institute of Education.

He was noted for his generosity as a teacher and mentor, for his total passion for music and his sense of humor, as well as for being a musician of great integrity. He is survived by his wife, Sheila, his son, Alex, and daughter, Rebecca, all of London, the residence of the Sunshine family since 1967. The funeral service and interment will be on Thursday, in London.

Pavarotti was a true lyric tenor, with astonishingly free and clear sound at the top of his range, and the coveted “ping” that led to his moniker, “King of the High Cs.” But beyond the beauty of his voice lay an artistry and understanding of singing that were just as rare. Listen to any Pavarotti recording and you will find a nearly perfect embodiment of bel canto style, as the great midcentury Italian tenors practiced it. His unforced approach made for superb elocution and idiomatic and natural phrasing.

Studying with tenors Arrigo Pola and Ettore Campogalliani, he created an absolutely distinctive sound. Soprano, director, and SFCV contributor Olivia Stapp recalls:

We both were students at the same time at the voice studio of Ettore Campogalliani in Mantova. That is where I first met him. He was outgoing and very cheerful, a hail-fellow-well-met sort, with a voice like his being — the most brilliant, beautifully timbered male voice I have ever heard. He was a true tenor, not like the bari-tenors who often shove up into the high range, rather like a shout. His range was well-extended into the very high, which he approached with grace. The maestro warmed him up on the vowel “aa” as in cat. When I asked why I was stuck with “o” he told me that the “aa” vowel was aligned to Pavarotti’s natural conformation. Now as an older singer, I realize that was the brilliance that gave his voice its presence and thrill.

Pavarotti also credited his work with Joan Sutherland, with whom he toured Australia in 1965 playing Edgardo to her Lucia, for teaching him a great deal about style. (And no doubt, Richard Bonynge, Sutherland’s husband, conductor, and a great authority on bel canto himself, also put in his two cents.)

A string of legendary performances beginning in the late ’60s established him as a star, including many for San Francisco Opera in the 1970s, where he first tried out many of his signature roles. He appeared in the Bay Area more than 20 times, including three performances in La Bohème. In New York when I was growing up, it was understood by the Metropolitan Opera management that if they didn’t feature both Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo at least once a season, they would be hung by their toenails in front of the Lincoln Center fountain. We could forgive the absence of acting skill or the ability to inhabit a part, because the vocal characterization and the singer’s generosity of spirit were overwhelming.

At the same time, Pavarotti’s discography swelled, as he made many of the recordings that fans still treasure. The “Ingemisco” from the Georg Solti recording of Verdi’s Requiem remains a personal favorite, as is his Nemorino in Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore from 1970, with Sutherland and Bonynge. His 1976 Christmas album, still a mainstay in many homes, helped propel the tenor on his long trip to superstardom, which eventually encompassed appearances on late-night television, one movie, duets with rock stars like U2’s Bono, and, of course, the Three Tenors phenomenon, which turned Puccini’s Nessun dorma into something like a Pavarotti theme song.

Purists who snicker at the Three Tenors’ showbiz antics should remember that such histrionics have always been an indivisible part of opera all the way back to the era of the castrati. And the great composers of Italian opera always understood this, as well.

Health and physical problems (including pancreatic cancer), most likely exacerbated by Pavarotti’s being overweight, took a toll on his voice, which began to deteriorate noticeably in the early 1990s. By then, a trail of important cancellations had affected his career in opera houses and he became more of a recital star.

But in spite of the difficulties of the latter part of his career, Pavarotti will be remembered as the iconic tenor of his generation, whose voice, artistry, and personality were as unique as any of the 20th century’s greatest opera stars. So if you’re waiting for the fourth tenor, or “the next Pavarotti,” don’t hold your breath.