Choices for November 10 and 11, 2017

Readers may recall that the choices for the first weekend in November were limited only to Saturday and Sunday. Through an ironic twist of circumstances, during the following weekend, choices will have to be made on Friday and Saturday. (This may mark the beginning of things quieting down prior to Thanksgiving, but I do not want to speak too soon on this matter.) On the other hand the first option involves activities that will begin on Friday and continue into Saturday of the following week. Specifics are as follows:

Friday, November 10, 6:30 p.m. through Saturday, November 18, 10:30 p.m., The Lab: Annea Lockwood will bring her surround-sound installation A Sound Map of the Danube to the Gallery space at The Lab. This was based on five field-recording trips that Lockwood made between the winter of 2001 and the summer of 2004. Her intent was to create an audio document of the 1785-mile extent of Europe’s second longest river, beginning at the sources in the Black Forest, progressing through Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania, and concluding at the delta formed at the Black Sea. Captured audio included the sounds of the river itself (both at the surface and underwater), aquatic insects, and the various inhabitants along the banks. In addition to the physical projection of the captured audio, the installation incorporates a large wall map of the river itself, a book of interview texts, and a rock taken from the river.

The duration of the captured audio is 167 minutes. It will be played twice a day on six days between Friday, November 10, and Friday, November 17. On each of those six days, the time of the first projection will be as follows:

1. Friday, November 10: 6:30 p.m.
2. Saturday, November 11: 4:30 p.m.
3. Sunday, November 12: 12:30 p.m.
4. Wednesday, November 15: 4:30 p.m.
5. Thursday, November 16: 4:30 p.m.
6. Friday, November 17: 6:30 p.m.

The second projection will begin shortly after the conclusion of the first. There will be no charge for admission, so visitors will be welcome to come and go freely. They are also invited to supplement the listening experience by bringing food, drinks, pets, pillows, and anything else within the bounds of common-sense reason.

Lockwood will then conclude her visit to The Lab with a performance of Jitterbug, a full-evening concert in which photographs of rocks are used as graphic scores. She will be joined by percussionist William Winant and guitarist Fred Frith. They will play within the context of a pre-recorded surround-sound environment consisting primarily of insect sounds. This performance will begin at 9 p.m. on Saturday, November 18, and is expected to last about 90 minutes.

The Lab is located in the Mission at 2948 16th Street. This is a short walk from the corner of Mission Street. This is particularly good for those using public transportation, since that corner provides bus stops for both north-south and east-west travel as well as a BART station.

Admission for Jitterbug will be $20, and members of The Lab will be admitted for $12. Advance registration is strongly advised. Separate Web pages have been created for members and the general public. Doors will open at 8:30 p.m., half an hour before the performance is scheduled to begin. Events at The Lab tend to attract a large turnout, so early arrival is almost always highly recommended.

Friday, November 10, 8 p.m., Herbst Theatre: For those who wish a more conventional listening experience, the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra will be presenting the next program in its 37th season. The title of the program will be Vivaldi in Venice; and long-time co-concertmaster Elizabeth Blumenstock will lead the ensemble. The program will begin with the seasonally-appropriate “Autumn” concerto from Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons; but the rest of the program will sample works by other composers known to Vivaldi and/or his fellow Venetians. Those composers will be Pietro Locatelli, Johann Georg Pisendel, Francesco Maria Veracini, George Frideric Handel, Tomaso Albinoni, Giuseppe Tartini, and André Campra.

Herbst Theatre is located at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. Ticket prices will range from $30.50 to $122.50 dollars for premium seating. Tickets are currently available for advance purchase through a City Box Office event page.

Saturday, November 11, 7:30 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: The next event in the 37th season of the Dynamite Guitars concert series presented by the Omni Foundation for the Performing Arts will be a solo recital by Russian classical guitar virtuoso Irina Kulikova. She will play her own arrangements of three of the movements from Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 1007 solo cello suite in G major and the second (in C-sharp minor) of Frédéric Chopin’s Opus 64 set of waltzes for solo piano. The Russian composers to be represented on her program will be Sergei Rudnev and Vassiliev Konstantin. Other composers on the program will be José María Gallardo Del Rey, Federico Moreno Torroba, and Agustín Barrios.

[article updated 11/3, 5:20 p.m.: Due to a visa complication during her travels, Kulikov will not be able to enter the United States for her concert schedule. She will be replaced by French guitarist Judicaël Perroy, who joined the teaching faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) this past March. He will play five of the short pieces ("brevidades") that his colleague Sérgio Assad wrote for brother Odair Assad. He will also play suites by Bach (BWV 997 in C minor) and Heitor Villa-Lobos (Suite Populaire Bresilienne), as well as an arrangement of Isaac Albéniz "Seville." The program will also include pieces by Agustín Barrios (Mangoré) and Johann Dubez. All information about tickets in the following paragraph, including the City Box Office hyperlink, remain the same.]

St. Mark’s is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of the corner of Franklin Street. All tickets will be general admission. Orchestra level seats will be sold for $55 with $45 for seats in the balcony. Tickets may be purchased in advance online through a City Box Office event page. Those wishing further information may call 415-242-4500.

Saturday, November 11, 8 p.m, Herbst Theatre: Benjamin Beilman will debut as guest concertmaster to lead the New Century Chamber Orchestra. This past February Beilman made his San Francisco recital debut in the first of the three Young Masters Series programs presented last season by San Francisco Performances. Before that, he had made his San Francisco Symphony debut in July of 2014. At this concert his solo work will be featured in a performance of Bach’s BWV 1042 violin concerto in E major, as well as the solo violin part in Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber’s musical depiction of a battle. His ensemble work will offer Gustav Mahler’s arrangement for string ensemble of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 95 (“Serioso”) string quartet in F minor, Igor Stravinsky’s “Basle” concerto in D, and Andrew Norman’s “Gran Turismo.”

There will be the usual Open Rehearsal held in the Kanbar Performing Arts Center at 44 Page Street, a short walk from the Muni Van Ness station. This will take place at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, November 8. All tickets are $15.

Concert tickets range in price from $29 to $61. City Box Office has set up a single Web page to handle both the open rehearsal and tickets for all concerts remaining in the season. It is also still possible to create a three-concert subscription, purchasing tickets for three concerts in three different months. Finally, discounted tickets are available at $15 for patrons under the age of 35 and at $10 for students with valid identification.