SFP’s Annual “Gift” to Subscribers and Donors

Violinist Geneva Lewis (courtesy of SFP)

Every year San Francisco Performances (SFP) offers a free concert to its subscribers and those that had donated at the level of Member or higher. Last year there were actually two of these “Gift” concerts, the first taking place in February with a performance of the piano trio with pianist Juho Pohjonen performing with cellist Jonathan Swensen and Stephen Waarts on violin and the second in April (almost exactly a year ago) with cellist Camille Thomas accompanied at the piano by Julien Brocal. This year’s event took place last night in Herbst Theatre, a performance by violinist Geneva Lewis, making her SFP recital debut and accompanied at the piano by Evren Ozel, making his SFP debut as well.

The program provided an impressively broad scope beginning with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in the opening selection and spanning to the last decade of the last century with Valentin Silvestrov’s “Post scriptum.” The early nineteenth century was represented by Robert and Clara Schumann, both of whom composed sets of three “Romances” for violin and piano. The program concluded at the other end of the century with César Franck’s A major sonata, which he composed as a wedding gift for the Belgian violinist Eugène Ysaÿe and has been acknowledged (including by Wikipedia) as his most popular work.

I found this to be an engaging journey of both the familiar and discovery. I have become familiar with Silvestrov primarily through ECM recordings, so I was looking forward to this recital opportunity. I was not disappointed; and, in the last of the three movements, Lewis ripped into pizzicato passages that had me on the edge of my seat! I also found myself wondering whether the final movement of Clara’s sonata served as reflections on Robert.

Most important, however, was how the Franck sonata served as a “grand finale.” Franck himself was a keyboardist, and it quickly becomes evident that his intention was that the two “voices” should perform as equals. Lewis and Ozel seemed to be aware of this intention and could not have done a better job of satisfying it. Following up on this “joint debut” appearance, I hope that the wait for a return visit will not be too long!