Reviews

San Francisco Conservatory of Music's young artists went way back in time to present an opera three-and-a-half centuries old, last weekend in Fort Mason Center's Cowell Theater.

Eighth blackbird's concert on Saturday defied elementary arithmetic. For example, the program featured two pieces, but four composers, which might seem twice as many composers as was required.

In newspaper ads touting his appearances with the Santa Rosa Symphony, Christopher O’Riley wore a black T-shirt, the better to show off a massive henna tattoo running the length of his arm, right down to the ends of his fingers.

May 7 will be Brahms' 175th birthday. You may have noticed that many musicians have been jumping the gun a bit to celebrate the event. The San Francisco Chamber Orchestra got out on the track Friday by delivering a fine performance of Brahms' Serenade No. 2 in A Major, Op. 16. The program in Herbst Theatre opened with a rare performance of Beethoven's Septet in E-flat Major, Op.

The crack early-music ensemble Magnificat attempted the difficult challenge of performing a Baroque comic opera in concert over the weekend. The form is unlike serious opera or slighter genres such as intermezzos or serenatas, which readily lend themselves to unstaged presentation.

To play all 32 Beethoven sonatas in public over two years, or 20, is one of the greatest challenges facing the pianist. The technical difficulties they present pale before the range of experience they embody and demand for their full realization.

Oh, my virgin ears. Was that a portamento in Haydn? Did he just play that open string on purpose in the middle of that phrase? Haydn didn't ever mark sul ponticello, did he? The Juilliard String Quartet, revered relics of a previous generation and a vanishing style, are still kickin' after all these years.

Musical links, not literary ones, generally form the basis of orchestral programs, but last week at Davies Symphony Hall, the San Francisco Symphony took a novel approach.

A decade or so back, there was some talk of a planned, independent-label Beethoven symphony cycle from Nicholas McGegan and the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, all the recording to be done in concert. Since then, PBO has taken to issuing live recordings on its own label, and the Beethoven project appears to be taking slow shape.

I came in hopes of a full solo recital from Leon Fleisher at Herbst Theatre on Saturday. I left grateful that Fleisher is back and in fine form as a soloist, and that he shared the stage with his wife, the pianist Katherine Jacobson Fleisher. The program included two late masterpieces by Schubert: one for piano duet, one solo.