Wednesday, May 9, 2018

CMSF to Launch Mini-Series for Summer

Last year Chamber Music San Francisco (CMSF) interleaved its annual concert season with a new Debut Series of five recitals, each introducing a new performer to San Francisco. This year Director Daniel Levenstein is taking a different approach to supplementing the primary subscription offering. During the month of June there will be a Summer Series of three recitals, all of which will take place at 8 p.m. on a Tuesday. The first two will take place in Herbst Theatre in the Veterans Building on the southwest corner of Van Ness Avenue and McAllister Street, and the last will take place at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music at 50 Oak Street, a short walk from the Van Ness Muni Station. Specifics are as follows:

June 5, Anderson & Roe Piano Duo: Pianists Greg Anderson and Elizabeth Joy Roe have built up an extensive and varied repertoire of music for both two pianos and four hands on a single keyboard. In the former category they will perform the first (Opus 5) of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s two suites for two pianos and Maurice Ravel’s two-piano version of “La Valse,” which was composed before the orchestral version. They will also play Anderson’s own four-hand arrangement of the second set of ballet music from Christoph Willibald Gluck’s opera Orfeo ed Euridice, often published as “Mélodie.” The program will also include three joint arrangements by Anderson and Roe, a fantasy on themes from Georges Bizet’s opera Carmen arranged for two pianos and four-hand suite of music by Astor Piazzolla and “Grand Scherzo,” an innovative arrangement of music from the Finale to the first act of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 588 opera Così fan tutte.

June 12, Sergey Khachatryan: This will be a program of three duo sonatas for violin and piano. Khachatryan will be accompanied by his sister Lusine. The program will begin with Mozart’s K. 454 sonata in B-flat major. This will be followed by Sergei Prokofiev’s Opus 94a sonata in D major, an arrangement of a sonata originally composed for flute and piano. The second half of the program will be devoted to César Franck’s A major sonata.

June 19, Escher String Quartet: This quartet of violinists Adam Barnett-Hart and Danbi Um, violist Pierre Lapointe, and cellist Brook Speltz is based in New York, where it serves as Season Artists of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. The full program has not yet been announced. However, during the second half the quartet will be joined by San Francisco cellist Jean-Michel Fonteneau for a performance of Franz Schubert’s D. 956 quintet in C major.

Tickets for individual concerts are all being sold for $50 with lower prices also available for seats in Herbst Theatre. Subscriptions to the entire series are available for $135. Hyperlinks for advance online purchase of both subscriptions and single tickets have all been set up at the top of the June Series Web page. Both tickets and subscriptions may also be purchased by called 415-392-4400.

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