Sunset Music and Arts: May, 2025

Last month at Sunset Music and Arts seems to have passed me by without any announcements of performances. Fortunately, things will pick up this month, even if there are only three events, all taking place during the first half of the month. The specific dates below will provide hyperlinks for online ticketing. For those not familiar with this concert series, it takes place at the Incarnation Episcopal Church, which is located in the Sunset at 1750 29th Avenue. This month’s events are as follows:

Saturday, May 10, 4 p.m.: This will be the next program to be presented by the San Francisco Youth Chorus, which is now entering its tenth year as one of the leading children’s choruses in the Bay Area; the program may revisit works from the Songs of Spring, Stage, and Screen concert, which was performed this past Saturday at the First Unitarian Universalist Church.

Saturday, May 10, 7:30 p.m.: The title of the program will be Canticles of Love and the selections will be sung by soprano Laurena Alm and mezzo Michelle Pavlova. They will be accompanied at the piano by Kerrilyn Renshaw. Renshaw is likely to lead the performance, since she serves as a vocal coach at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. She has also performed as Orchestra Pianist with the San Francisco Symphony and worked as Staff Pianist for the San Francisco Opera.

Sarah Wood, Elaine Kreston, and Lisa Maresch on the poster for their Sunset Music and Arts recital this month (from the Sunset home page)

Saturday, May 17, 7:30 p.m.: The last of the three programs will performed by a piano trio whose members are Sarah Wood (violin), Elaine Kreston (cello), and Lisa Maresch (piano). The title of their program will be Living For Art: The Piano Trios of Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms. Those that know their music history probably also know that Brahms moved in with Schumann after her husband Robert was committed to an asylum where he died of syphilis. The program will begin with Clara’s only piano trio, her Opus 17 in G minor. The second half of the program will present the original version of Johannes Brahms’ Opus 8 trio in B major.