Reviews

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony trumps everything. What else can hold its own on a program with this searching quest that leads to the most fervent final movement in music history? The Oakland East Bay Symphony, under Music Director Michael Morgan’s baton, offered a proposal at once modest and moving.

Gustavo Dudamel brings a cheering crowd to their feet with a predictable, but audience-effective rendition of Tchaikovsky’s Pathetique symphony, while Jean-Yves Thibaudet entertains with Leonard Bernstein’s The Age of Anxiety.

Patrons returning for the second half of Monday night’s Santa Rosa Symphony concert witnessed the unusual sight of five microphones: one to the left of the conductor’s podium, and four to the right. These peculiar forces and accoutrements had been assembled by Music Director Bruno Ferrandis for Kurt Weill’s Seven Deadly Sins.

ChamberBridge’s Sunday recital at Old First Church in San Francisco was a model of compositional and interpretive invention, with the San Francisco–based duo of soprano Lara Bruckmann and pianist Eva-Maria Zimmermann providing vivid performances of newly commissioned work by a mix of American and Swiss composers.

It would not be impossible to construct a program of three piano trios more taxing than the one the Skride/Vogler Trio played last Tuesday at Herbst Theatre. It might, though, be difficult to find anyone willing to play it.

Anyone who might have arrived very late for Saturday’s splendid New Century Chamber Orchestra concert at Herbst Theatre would have gotten an amusing summary from fiddler Evan Price.

When considering this well-performed recording, don’t place too much significance in its title. Geographically, historically, and stylistically, the five compositions are stretched so far that they defy any programmatic theme, though the Germans may have bought into the cutesy, New World concept more quickly than those of us who actually live here.

From almost the moment that guest conductor Christoph Eschenbach struck up Brahms’ Symphony No. 2 with the San Francisco Symphony last Wednesday, it was clear that this was going to be a Brahms of the bright colors. It was set against a lovely recent French work by Marc-André Dalbavie.

Guest conductor Christoph Eschenbach lit flames in two symphonies with the San Francisco Symphony at Davies Hall on Saturday evening. Whether he was conducting a familiar warhorse or a rarity Eschenbach made them sear.

Bach’s great Passion According to Saint John was given eloquent voice by the California Bach Society Sunday afternoon at the First Congregational Church of Berkeley. The Passion — the story of the end of Jesus’ life — is operatic, in the sense of combining narrative and commentary.