Chanticleer Announces 49th Bay Area Season

Once again, Chanticleer is an “early bird” when it comes to announcing its new season. As was the case last season, there will be four programs. Both subscriptions and single tickets are now available for the performances in the 2026–27 season. The first of these will be a fully-staged production, which will be given six performances. The remaining three programs will be given only single performances in San Francisco. As was the case last season, a Web page has been created for subscription purposes, which includes not only the entire season but also reduced subscriptions for either three or two of the programs. Program details have not yet been finalized, but currently available information for performances in San Francisco is as follows:

Sunday, September 13, 2 p.m. and 5 p.m., Thursday, September 17, 7:30 p.m., Saturday, September 19, 7:30 p.m., 2 p.m., and 5 p.m., and Sunday, September 20, 2 p.m., ODC Theatre: The season will begin with Chanticleer’s first fully staged production since its landmark performance of Curlew River. The full title of the offering is The Machaut Project: Devotion & Desire. This has been conceived as “an immersive, visually striking journey into the richly textured medieval world of Guillaume de Machaut.” Machaut’s Wikipedia page describes him as “the central figure of the ars nova style in late medieval music;” and he “has an unprecedented amount of surviving music, in part due to his own involvement in his manuscripts' creation and preservation.” I shall not even begin to speculate on how Elkhanah Pulitzer will stage this music!

Chanticleer’s annual banner for the Christmas season

Sunday, December 20, 8 p.m., St. Ignatius Church: A Chanticleer Christmas will follow the usual tour of the Bay Area with one performance in San Francisco. As usual, the program will present a vision of joy and transcendence through beautifully sung music of all centuries, beginning with a candlelit chant procession. In all likelihood the conclusion will be one of an upbeat gospel celebration.

Saturday, March 13, 2 p.m., Mission Dolores Basilica: Valentini Unveiled is named for the early Baroque composer Giovanni Valentini. His approach to composition was influenced by the clavicymbalum universale, an enharmonic keyboard with 19 keys per octave. The program will present the six Litaniae Lauretanae, along with selected motets. Instrumental accompaniment will be provided by the Baroque ensemble ACRONYM, which will perform selected sonatas.

Saturday, May 22, 2 p.m., San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall: The title of the final program is Paradise, described as an exploration of “humanity’s eternal longing for the ideal: visions of a perfect world, perfect love, or perfect future.” The repertoire will extend from the Renaissance period of Jean Mouton and Juan Gutiérrez de Padilla to the recent past of Bobby McFerrin’s “The 23rd Psalm.” Other familiar composers on the program will include Darius Milhaud (“Psalm 121”) and Jean Sibelius (“Rakastava”).

An SFS Memorial Program for MTT at Davies

Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) became the eleventh Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) in 1995, meaning that my wife and I made our move from Singapore to Palo Alto in time to enjoy his first full season with that orchestra. This week’s performances, beginning last night, were dedicated in his memory. As might be expected, one of his own works was on the program, “Agnegram,” which he composed in 1998, giving its world premiere with SFS. This was preceded by the music of another American composer from the other end of the twentieth century. MTT clearly showed a particular fondness for Charles Ives’ “The Unanswered Question,” which served as a “prelude” to “Agnegram.” The first half of the program began with the SFS Chorus, directed by Jenny Wong, singing the fourth of the seven movements in Johannes Brahms’ Opus 45, A German Requiem. The Chorus returned following the intermission for the performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 125 (ninth) symphony in D minor, whose final movement included both chorus and four vocal soloists: soprano Jessica Faselt, mezzo Kelley O’Connor, tenor Thomas Cooley, and bass Peixin Chen.

Conductor James Gaffigan (photograph by Miguel Lorenzo, courtesy of SFS)

Taken as a whole, this was a major undertaking to honor the memory of a conductor, who was never shy about major undertakings. Conductor James Gaffigan is no stranger to SFS, and he found just the right chemistry for approaching the contrasts of the different works on the program. The members of the orchestra (many of whom were familiar with MTT) followed Gaffigan every step of the way to give each of the offerings its own uniquely well-defined statement.

Both concert repertoires and their audiences tend to approach performance as an act of the present honoring the past. Between the twentieth century of MTT and Ives and the nineteenth century of two of the “three B’s,” Beethoven and Brahms, there was more than enough to honor. However, what was most important was that Gaffigan led the performers in the spirit of the immediate present, reflecting on the past but establishing a unique voice of its own.

This program will be given two more performances, tomorrow night (Saturday) at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday (June 21) at 2 p.m.; and the offering is definitely “one for the books!”

Zephyr Symphony: The 2026–2027 Season

Don Scott Carpenter conducting in St. Mark's Lutheran Church 

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church will again serve as the home for the Zephyr Symphony led by conductor Don Scott Carpenter. The new season will present five programs (one more than last season). Three of them will involve vocal soloists, and one will have guitarist Thibault Garcia as the visiting soloist. Most readers probably know by now that St. Mark’s Lutheran Church is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of the corner of Franklin Street. All performances will begin on Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m. on the following dates:

September 26, The Work at Hand: Mezzo Jamie Barton and cellist Nathan Chan will be featured in the Bay Area premiere of Jake Heggie’s song cycle The Work at Hand. The program will begin with Arvo Pärt’s “Trisagion.” The second half of the program will be devoted entirely to Felix Mendelssohn’s Opus 90 (MWV N 16), his fourth (“Italian”) symphony composed in the key of A major.

November 14, Trans Requiem: The title of the program is the title of the work to be performed during the second half, composed by Andrew Yee in 2025. Soprano Breanna Sinclairé and vocalist Katherine Goforth will be soloists performing with the Zephyr Chorus. Yee will also be cello soloist. The program will begin with Jesse Montgomery’s “Banner,” followed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Opus 48 in C major, his four-movement “Serenade for Strings.”

December 19, Mozart’s Messiah: K. 572, is Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's 1789 German-language version of George Frideric Handel’s HWV 56 oratorio Messiah. This version has its own Wikipedia page, which describes Mozart’s efforts as follows:

The libretto of Mozart's adaptation was largely based on Luther's translation of the Bible. Mozart re-orchestrated about three-fifths of Handel's composition, primarily providing additional parts for an extended section of wind instruments, which was called Harmonie at the time. In general, a half-century after the inception of the work, Mozart adapted an English-language work conceived for a baroque orchestra in a public venue, to accommodate the constraints of private performances and the musical tastes of Vienna. 

The vocal soloists for this performance will be soprano Nicole Heaston, mezzo-soprano Kayleigh Decker, tenor Isaiah Bell, bass-baritone Sreten Manojlović. The chorus will be Vox Humana SF.

March 6, Sacred & Sensuous: Music of Devotion: The next performance by Vox Humana SF will be of the Missa pro defunctis (a setting of the Requiem mass) by Cristóbal de Morales. The second half of the program will be devoted to the best-known composition by Joaquín Rodrigo, his “Concierto de Aranjuez” guitar concerto. The soloist will be Thibault Garcia.

May 8: Kindertotenlieder: Music of Sorrow, Serenity, and Radiant Joy: Baritone Benjamin Appl will be the vocalist in the performance of Gustav Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder (songs on the death of children) song cycle. This will be followed by Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 92, his seventh symphony in A major. Musicologist Harry Goldschmidt has suggested that (as noted in the Wikipedia page for the symphony) the symphony “seems to be another one of his musical confrontations with Napoleon, this time in the context of the European wars of liberation from years of Napoleonic domination.” The program will begin with Anna Clyne’s “Within Her Arms.”

Peter Whelan to Begin Tenure with PBO in July

Peter Whelan will curate his first season as Music Director of the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale (PBO) in a little over a month’s time. San Francisco will see a series of six concerts beginning next month and continuing through April of next year.  As in the past, in addition to full-season subscriptions, there will be Choose-Your-Own subscriptions for five, four, or three concerts. Also as in the past, all San Francisco performances will take place at 7:30 p.m. in Herbst Theatre, located at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. Subscriptions are now on sale, and a Web page has been created, which provides separate hyperlinks for the available options. The San Francisco dates are as follows:

Thursday, July 23, Handel’s Tolomeo: The season will begin with a semi-staged production of George Frideric Handel’s opera seria, Tolomeo, re d'Egitto (Ptolemy, King of Egypt), HWV 25. The advance material I received describes the production as  a “historically informed performance with theatrical elements to heighten the drama.” Countertenor Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen will perform the title role. Other vocalists will be countertenor Kangmin Justin Kim, sopranos Lauren Snouffer and Nicole Heaston, and bass-baritone Dashon Burton.

Friday, November 13, Handel’s The Power of Music: The five-concert subscription series will begin with the United States premiere of the 1772 Dublin version of the HWV 75 ode, Alexander’s Feast; vocal soloists will be soprano Sherezade Panthaki, mezzo Rachael Wilson, and tenor James Way with Valérie Sainte-Agathe leading the Philharmonia Chorale.

Friday, December 4, Baroque Brilliance: The program will begin with more Handel, this time limited to a single aria, “Let the Bright Seraphim” from the HWV 57 three-act oratorio Samson performed by soprano Kathryn Mueller. The second half of the program will present two members of the Bach family. It will conclude with the BWV 51 cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach. This will be preceded by a concerto composed by his son, Carl Philipp Emanuel, his Wq. 172 concerto for cello in A major. This, in turn, will be preceded by the last of the three orchestral suites composed by Georg Philipp Telemann, the TWV 55:G10 Burlesque de Quixotte. In the first half of the program, Mueller will also sing the West Coast premiere of “O virgo, cui salute debet orbis,” composed by Marianna Martines, whose keyboard music was recently recorded by Signum Classics on an album release this past April.

Friday, February 5, Vivaldi and the Oud: I suspect that it is very unlikely that Vivaldi knew anything about the oud. However, Philharmonic Baroque Composer-in-Residence Tarik O’Regan has composed a concerto for it with accompaniment by strings and percussion (perhaps with a nod to Béla Bartók). This new work will be both preceded and followed by works by Antonio Vivaldi. The program will begin with the overture to RV 725, the three-act dramma per musica entitled L'Olimpiade. The second half of the program will survey selected movements from L'estro armonico, Vivaldi’s Opus 3 collection of twelve concertos for string instruments.

Friday, March 5, Baroque on Stage: The first half of this program will survey a selection of works composed for staged performances by Henry Purcell and Jean-Philippe Rameau. It will conclude with a set of variations on the “Folia” theme, composed by Francesco Geminiani in an arrangement by Michi Wiancko. There will also be a concerto in E minor by Antonio Vivaldi, which will apparently be a “synthesis” of RV 273 and RV 278. The second half of the program will begin with Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s Wq. 182:5, a symphony in B minor.

William Blake’s The Ancient of Days, a depiction of the angel Urizen planning the Creation

Friday, April 9, The Creation: Having began the season with an opera, PBO will conclude with an oratorio. This will be The Creation, the Hoboken XXI:2 oratorio by Joseph Haydn. The vocal soloists will be soprano Lucy Crowe, tenor Nicholas Phan, and bass-baritone Enrico Lagasca. Valérie Sainte-Agathe will again lead the Philharmonia Chorale.

A Less Familiar Side of Darius Milhaud

Cover of the album being discussed

Every month I receive, through electronic mail, a newsletter from Naxos entitled Musical Discoveries. The title of this month’s release was Les Six: Celebrate the Iconic French Composer Group. This past Sunday, when I wrote about the Naxos release of solo piano compositions by Darius Milhaud, I provided little information about the composer’s background, other than his membership in Les Six. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this biography is that, as can be found on his Wikipedia Web page, he was born into “a long-established Jewish family of the Comtat Venaissin—a secluded region of Provence—with roots traceable there at least to the 15th century. On his father's side, Milhaud's Jewish lineage was thus neither Ashkenazi nor Sephardi, but specifically Provençal—dating to Jewish settlement in that part of France as early as the first centuries of the Common Era. Milhaud's mother was partly Sephardi on her father's side, via a Sephardi family from Italy.”

In my past encounters with Milhaud’s music, I never gave much thought to his religion. However, one of the compositions cited in the newsletter was his Sacred Service, composed for baritone soloist, narrator (speaking), choir, and orchestra. The liturgical texts are all sung in Hebrew, and there are three “interventions” from the narrator. The Mourner’s Kaddish is first spoken and then sung by the choir.

Since I was born Jewish, my pre-teen years included preparation for the bar mitzvah celebration of my thirteenth birthday. As a result, I was familiar with almost all of the texts that Milhaud had set. I am pretty certain that, at that time, no one I knew was aware of Milhaud’s undertaking.

The album was originally released in October of 2004, and it would not surprise me to learn that it has attracted little attention. The only performer familiar to me is the conductor, Gerard Schwarz. Rabbi Rodney Mariner delivers the spoken texts, and the solo vocal work is sung by baritone Yaron Windmueller. The Prague Philharmonic Choir joins forces with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.

It goes without saying that I was drawn to this album by pure curiosity. Madeline Milhaud is quoted as calling it “a work of love,” suggesting that both she and her husband took their Jewish ancestry (if not religion in day-to-day life) seriously. From my own atheist perspective, I am more interested in how the composition came to be. It was commissioned by Congregation Emanu-El, one of the three oldest synagogues in San Francisco. It is located on the northwest corner of Arguello Boulevard and Lake Street, about halfway between California Street and the Presidio grounds.

However, the music was not given its first performance at that site (since it would go against constraints imposed by the service itself). Instead, it was given its first performance on May 18, 1949 by the San Francisco Symphony with Milhaud himself on the podium. The narrator in baritone solo is not identified on the Wikipedia page, but the choral performance was by the Berkeley Chorus of the University of California. Since I was not yet three years old at that time, I was unable to attend!

Ninth Planet to Present Monodrama

Poster design for the performance being discussed

According to my archives, I have not written about the new music ensemble Ninth Planet since they began their season this past November. That said, next month the ensemble will perform the monodrama Mother Eve, with music by Emma Logan and original words by her husband, Patrick Smith. As might be guessed, the title character is the Eve in the book of Genesis. According to the advance material, the narrative “uses her as a kind of eternal icon, from the first false promise of paradise to all of humanity’s promises that follow.” The vocalist for this monodrama will be mezzo Kindra Scharich, accompanied by Ninth Planet musicians.

The event will be given only one performance, beginning at 7:30 p.m. and lasting for about two hours. The venue will be the Little Mission Studio at 455 Hampshire Street. General admission will be $33.85 with a Senior Discount of $28.52. There will also be a $17.85 “as-needed” rate, available for both students and educators. Tickets may be purchased online through an Eventbrite Web page.

Discovering Honegger’s “Symphonic Psalm”

This past Friday, the theme of the latest newsletter I received from Naxos was entitled Les Six: Celebrate the Iconic French Composer Group. These were six composers that “set the bar,” so to speak, for inventiveness in the early twentieth century. In alphabetical order (which is how they appear on their Wikipedia Web page), these composers were Georges Auric (1899–1983), Louis Durey (1888–1979), Arthur Honegger (1892–1955), Darius Milhaud (1892–1974), Francis Poulenc (1899–1963), and Germaine Tailleferre (1892–1983).

I first became aware of them in secondary school, due in some part of Poulenc’s relationship with the Philadelphia Orchestra but also through albums released by Columbia Records. Sadly, by the time my vinyl collection gave way to compact discs, both the composers and their works seldom made appearances in either symphonic performances or chamber music. As a result, my reaction to the new Naxos newsletter was one of irresistible nostalgia.

Nevertheless, I do not feel a strong need to take a “deep dive” into all of the music that emerged from this period in the twentieth century. Instead, I plan to limit myself to only two compositions, both with “roots” in Judaism. Mind you, the composers’ “roots” to the religion were not particularly deep. Honegger’s feelings seem to be, at best, tenuous, while Milhaud’s interests were more inclined to Brazilian popular music than in his Jewish ancestry.

Cover design for the album begin discussed (from its Amazon.com Web page)

That said, the Naxos album I selected was Honneger’s Le Roi David with the subtitled “Psaume symphonique en trois parties” (symphonic psalm in three parts) based on a play by René Morax. The unfolding of the narrative of that play is framed by a narrator (Jacques Martin on the Naxos album). There is also a spoken role for “La pythonisse” (better known in this country as the Witch of Endor). The Wikipedia page accounts for the narrative framework as follows:

The plot, based on biblical narration, tells the story of King David, first a shepherd boy, his victories in battle, relationship to Saul, rise to power, adultery, mourning of his son's death, and finally his own death.

Listening to this recording felt like a journey into my distant past. Unless I am mistaken, I have not listened to Honneger’s music since I wrote about his third symphony in 2022, when it was included in the French Music album in the Hans Rosbaud Edition collection. The Naxos album, on the other hand, dates back to a recording session in 1997. Nevertheless, I have to confess that, these days, I feel as if I am being bombarded with novelty; so I find it almost refreshing to “turn back the clock” for more than a couple of decades!

June to Begin with a Busy Weekend

Readers may recall that the first weekend of this month was a busy one, accounted for by last week’s Bleeding Edge article. Next month’s first weekend will not be quite as busy, but it will still involve choices over the course of both Saturday (June 6) and Sunday (June 7). As far as I can tell, I have already accounted for only two items, both of which will take place on Saturday at 7:30 p.m.:

1. The San Francisco Symphony concert in Davies Symphony Hall, featuring mezzo Sasha Cooke singing both the song cycle Les Nuits d’été by Hector Berlioz and the “Liebestod” from the conclusion of Richard Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde.
2. The return to the San Francisco Opera of Gioachino Rossini’s The Barber of Seville staged by Emilio Sagi.

The remaining “competing” events will be as follows:

Saturday, June 6, 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, June 7, 3 p.m., Ruth Williams Opera House: Omari Tau, who is a composer as well as a stage director, will present theatrical interpretations of music from the current and preceding centuries. The program will begin with the world premiere performance of “Steam,” composed by David Dominique, who also prepared the libretto in partnership with Joseph Tepperman. This will be performed with cinematography by Kevin Everson. In the second half of the program, Tau will serve as narrator for a performance of Igor Stravinsky’s “L'Histoire du soldat” (tale of the soldier). Music will be provided by Left Coast Chamber Ensemble (LCCE) instrumentalists Anna Presler on violin, bassist Michel Taddei, and Loren Mach on percussion, joined by guest musicians Jamael Smith on bassoon, trumpeter John Freeman, and Chase Waterbury on trombone. LCCE has created a Web page with hyperlinks for purchasing tickets to both of the performances. The venue is located in South San Francisco at 4705 3rd Street.

Violinist Patrick Galvin and pianist Keisuke Nakagoshi (from the Eventbrite Web page for purchasing tickets to their duo performance)

Saturday, June 6, 7:30 p.m., Incarnation Episcopal Church: Violinist Patrick Galvin will perform duets with pianist Keisuke Nakagoshi. The major works on the program will be two sonatas, the first in G minor by Claude Debussy, and the second in F minor by Sergei Prokofiev, his Opus 80 and the first of the two violin sonatas he composed. The program will begin with the three-movement “Metamorphosis,” composed in 2021 by Emma Greenhill; and it will conclude with Amy Beach’s Opus 23, given the title “Romance.” The church is located in the Sunset at 1750. 29th Avenue. Tickets are being sold online through an Eventbrite Web page.

Saturday, June 6, 8:30 p.m., and Wednesday, June 17, 8 p.m., The Lab: As of this writing only two performances have been scheduled at this venue. The first of these will be two solo performances by Weston Olencki playing “prepared autoharp and electromechanical banjo.” Amy Koohbor will perform “Korkari,” which she composed for an electroacoustic backgammon board. The second will also be offer solo performances, but this time there will be three of them! Wendy Eisenberg is a virtuoso guitarist, who also composes and sings her own songs. Sound artist Mari Maurice will present the results of her latest project in Brooklyn, More Ease. The final performer will be another guitarist, Jas Stade, who is as comfortable with art rock as she is with the classical repertoire. For those that do not already know, the venue is located in the Mission at 1948 16th Street, a short walk east of Mission Street.

Sunday, June 7, and Sunday, June 14, 2 p.m., and Thursday, June 11, Friday, June 19, Tuesday, June 13, and Saturday, June 27, 7:30 p.m., War Memorial Opera House: This will be the first of the two operas to be presented by San Francisco Opera next month. The advance material I received describes Richard Strauss’ “Elektra” as a “tense, one-act thriller.” Keith Warner decided to stage the production in a museum with an exhibit about ancient Greece and the House of Atreus. A young woman is inadvertently trapped in the museum overnight and bears witness to the cycle of violence that Agamemnon and his family confronted after the Trojan War. The title role will be sung by Russian soprano Elena Pankratova, and Eun Sun Kim will conduct. A single Web page has been created for purchasing tickets to each of the performance. For those that do not already know, the venue is located at 301 Van Ness Avenue, on the other side of Grove Street from Davies Symphony Hall.

Sunday, June 7, 5 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: Chanticleer will conclude its tour of the Bay Area for the final program of the season. The title of the program is American Early Music. Music was part of our country’s experiences at least since the eighteenth century, when hymns originating in England crossed the Atlantic Ocean. Related genres include spirituals and folk music, all with particular attention to the polyphony of part-singing. The church is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of Franklin Street. City Box Office has created a Web page for purchasing tickets, including a “map” showing where seats are available.

AVIE Releases New Cantata Collective Album

A little over a year ago AVIE Records released a new album anticipating the celebration of Easter. The performance was by the Orchestra and Chorus of Cantata Collective joined by four vocal soloists. Tomorrow AVIE will release a new album, which may be taken as a “prequel” to the two compositions on the Easter album. As might be guessed, the composer for all of these works is Johann Sebastian Bach.

Cover of the album being discussed (from its Amazon.com Web page)

The new release is a more ambitious undertaking. While the two Easter selections fit on a single CD, the “physical” version will occupy three CDs. These will account for the entirety of Bach’s BWV 244 St Matthew Passion. This is in two parts, the first on the first CD and the second distributed across the other two.

Once again the conductor will be Nicholas McGegan, but there will be a more generous number of vocal soloists. Four of them are assigned “roles” in the narrative: bass-baritone Paul Max Tipton is Jesus, baritone Harrison Hintzsche is Pontius Pilate, and the narration of the Gospel texts is sung by tenor Thomas Cooley as the Evangelist, soprano Sherezade Panthaki is Pilate’s wife. Panthaki and Hintzsche also sing the soprano and bass arias, respectively. The other vocalists are countertenor Reginald Mobley and tenor James Reese.

Because BWV 244 is so much more massive than the contents of the AVIE Easter album, my opportunities to write about the music have been few and far between. My last opportunity came a little more than exactly two years ago. That was when I wrote about the second “volume” in the Warner Classics Remastered Edition of recordings of the conductor Otto Klemperer, given the subtitle Operas & Sacred Works. Klemperer, of course, predated the very idea of “historically informed performance;” and I have to confess that listening to his recording reminded me of spending a long period of time on an uncomfortable church bench! McGegan, on the other hand, has a better sense of “pace;” and, after listening to this new release several times, I have come to enjoy the overall experience, rather than dreading it as an ordeal!

Choices for May 1, 2026

It often seems that things get busy during what is basically the last month of the concert season. This year the need to make choices will begin at the very start of the month. As of this writing, there are three overlapping events, on the first day of the month all beginning at 7:30 p.m., each with its own unique offerings. The good news is that the diversity of the programs may make it easier for listeners to decide which concert to attend. Specifics are as follows:

Taube Atrium Theater: The San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, led by conductor Jory Fankuchen, will host this year’s Irving Klein Competition, violinist Julia Schilz. She will be the soloist in a performance of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 219, the last of his five violin concertos, composed in the key of A major. On the premise that “one good fifth deserves another,” the concerto will be followed by Franz Schubert’s D. 485, his fifth symphony in the key of B-flat major. The program will begin with the third movement of the first Sinfonietta composed by Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson. There will be no charge for admission, meaning that tickets are not required. The venue is located on the top floor of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue, on the southwest corner of McAllister Street.

St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: California Bach Society will conclude its season with a program entitled Psalmen Davis: Three Centuries of Sacred Song. The title refers to a composition by Heinrich Schütz, which will be the “main event” of the program. Those psalms will also be present in different settings by two of Schütz’ predecessors, Jacobus Gallus and Salamone Rossi. There will also be nineteenth century settings composed by Felix Mendelssohn. General admission will be $35, but there is now a Choose What You Pay option for advance ticket purchasing, which may be enabled through the Society’s Web page. For those that do not already know, the church is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of Franklin Street.

The members of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain (from their SFP event page)

Herbst Theatre: The final event to be presented by San Francisco Performances will be the return of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. They last visited Herbst on April 16, 2024. The group is a septet with members playing five different sizes of the instrument. The program will be announced from the stage. Tickets are currently being sold for $100, $85, and $70; and a Web page has been created for online purchases.

April to Conclude with Another Busy Weekend

April is turning out to be such a busy month that it was necessary to provide separate articles for Saturday and Sunday of next weekend. On the following weekend the month will conclude with busy days on Friday and Saturday. One of the events was already reported at the beginning of this month: the performance of The Days Pass Quickly Immersed int he Shadow of Eternity, composed by Lea Bertucci for sampled and live early flutes in 8-channel sound. As usual, there will involve a diversity of other performances at a diversity of venues. As of this writing, specifics are as follows:

Friday, April 24, and Saturday, April 25, 7:30 p.m., St. Ignatius Church: The San Francisco Choral Society, led by Artistic Director Robert Geary, is preparing for a new work by the Ukrainian composer Oleksandr Shchetynsky entitled Signs of Grace. The performance will be preceded by more familiar sacred music from Eastern Europe, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Opus 37, the “All-Night Vigil,” setting fifteen texts from the Russian Orthodox ceremony. Tickets are being sold by City Box Office at prices from $40 to $65 with discounts for seniors, students, and those under the age of 30. Tickets may be purchased online, and City Box Office has created separate Web pages for Friday and Saturday. In addition, the Saturday performance will be livestreamed with digital tickets sold for $40. The church is located on the campus of the University of San Francisco at 650 Parker Avenue, on the northeast corner of Fulton Street.

Friday, April 24, 7:30 p.m., Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall, San Francisco Conservatory of Music: The next Omni Foundation for the Performing Arts program is entitled A to Z Guitar Duo. That title refers to two of the most commanding guitarists currently in Europe, Aniello Desiderio and Zoran Dukić. Program details have not yet been announced. General admission will be $70. Tickets may be purchased through a Humanitix Web page. The Concert Hall is located in the Conservatory building at 50 Oak Street.

Friday, April 24, Saturday, April 25, Friday, May 1, and Saturday, May 2, 8 p.m., Saturday, April 25, Sunday, April 26, Saturday, May 2, and Sunday, May 3, 2 p.m., and Tuesday, April 28, Wednesday, April 29, and Thursday, April 30, 7:30 p.m., War Memorial Opera House: Mere Mortals is a full-evening ballet created by choreographer Aszure Barton. The narrative amounts to a technology perspective on the Pandora myth. This will be the return of a ballet originally commissioned for the inaugural season of Artistic Director Tamar Rojo. A single Web page has been created for ticket purchases. As many (most?) readers know, this venue is located on the southwest corner of Van Ness Avenue and Grove Street.

1971 photograph of Astor Piazzolla with his bandoneon (from a Wikimedia Commons Web page, copyright by Pupeto Mastropasqua)

Saturday, April 25, 2 p.m., Presidio Theatre: The New Century Chamber Orchestra will conclude its season with a program entitled Radiance in Rhythm. The guest soloist will be guitarist Pablo Sáinz-Villegas, who will be the soloist in the final selection, the “Concierto de Aranjuez” composed by Joaquín Rodrigo. Sáinz-Villegas will also perform Michael Daugherty’s “Bay of Pigs,” a reflection on a darker period in the past history of our country. There will also be a world premiere performance of “Blues Variations,” composed by Henry Dorn on a New Century commission as part of the Emerging Black Composers Project. The other composers on the program will be Astor Piazzolla (“Fuga y misterio”) and Alberto Williams (“Primera Suite Argentina”). As usual, Daniel Hope will serve as both music director and concertmaster. The venue is located in the Presidio of San Francisco on the south side of the Golden Gate and the bridge that crosses it. City Box Office has created a Web page for online ticket purchases.

Bernard Labadie Shifts from Mozart to Bach

Conductor Bernard Labadie (photograph by Winnie Au, courtesy of the San Francisco Symphony)

Conductor Bernard Labadie made his debut with the San Francisco Symphony in 2005 and has been making regular visits since then. His most recent visit took place in November of 2024, when he presented a program devoted entirely to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This week he prepared another single-composer program, this time surveying the sacred music composed by Johann Sebastian Bach.

The program began and concluded with two significant choral compositions. The program began with a slightly belated account of BWV 249, the Easter Oratorio. This is one of Bach’s less familiar compositions, and last night’s performance was the first ever given by SFS. (It is also significantly shorter than many of the more familiar major sacred music compositions.) The concluding selection was the BWV 243 setting of the “Magnificat” canticle. Labadie provided this performance with an “overture” in the form of the opening sinfonia for BWV 29, the cantata Wir danken dir, Gott. Unless I am mistaken, this was the first time that Labadie prepared a program of sacred music since April of 2008, when he presented two choral compositions by Joseph Haydn.

Last night saw a solid account of all three of the selections. Labadie charted just the right course through the many diverse dispositions that Bach brought to his sacred music. He devoted equal attention to the instrumentalists, the vocal soloists, and the chorus, all of whom seemed to be perfectly satisfied in following his lead. The soloists were soprano Joélle Harvey, countertenor Hugh Cutting, tenor Andrew Haji, and baritone Joshua Hopkins. It may seem a bit “out of touch” to refer to a performance of sacred music as “refreshing;” but it was that aspect of Labadie’s rhetorical stance that made the listening experience engaging from start to finish. Sacred music can do justice to liturgical passages without being somber about them, and that was precisely how Labadie approached Bach’s music last night.

Jordi Savall Turns to Charpentier Choral Music

Cover of the album being discussed

One week from today, Alla Vox will reissue an album of music by Marc-Antoine Charpentier originally released in December of 2025. This is a choral offering with Jordi Savall leading the Choir of La Capella Reial de Catalunya. Instrumental accompaniment is provided by Le Concert des Nations. The primary selection on the album is the composer’s multi-movement setting of the H. 146 Te Deum hymn. This is coupled withe the H. 416 setting of the canticle “In nativitatem Domini.”

H. 146 is given a rich instrumental account, complete with trumpets and drums. There are five vocal soloists: soprano Flore van Meerssche, mezzo Kristin Mulders, countertenor Andrés Montilla-Acurero, tenor Cyril Auvity, and baritone Mauro Borgioni. There is also alternation between the full chorus and a “Petit chœur.” The text is basically a celebratory one, which establishes the overall disposition of the hymn setting itself. On the other hand, as the title suggests, H. 416 is a reflection on the Nativity in which the context is established through three instrumental movements.

Some readers may recall that, this past December, the California Bach Society presented another Charpentier setting of “In nativitatem Domini,” his H. 314. Given that this happened three months ago, I am in no position to “compare and contrast” the two settings! Suffice it to say that there is a generous share of instrumental music to establish the festive mood of the celebration of the Nativity. It also goes without saying that H. 146 is just as festive with its vigorous performance established by the interplay of brass and percussion at the very beginning.

Taken as a whole, the album serves up an entirely satisfying listening experience; and those that cannot wait to listen can pre-order the album through its Amazon.com Web page.

SFS Programs for April, 2026

Next month the diversity in San Francisco Symphony (SFS) performances will extend beyond Davies Symphony Hall. Fortunately, all of the dates and times will have hyperlinks to facilitate ticket purchases. As usual, tickets may also be acquired at the Box Office, which is at the entrance to Davies on the south side of Grove Street, between Van Ness Avenue and Franklin Street.

Thursday, April 9, Friday, April 10, and Saturday, April 11, 7:30 p.m.: Canadian conductor Bernard Labadie will return to Davies. His last visit was in November of 2024, when he devoted his program entirely to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He will return with a program featuring two major choral compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach. The program will begin with the BWV 249 Easter Oratorio and conclude with the BWV 243 setting of the Magnificat text in D major. The latter will be preceded by an “overture,” which was originally composed for the beginning of the BWV 29 cantata Wir danken dir, Gott. Both choral offerings will include the SFS Chorus, whose Director is Jenny Wong. The vocal soloists will be soprano Joélle Harvey, countertenor Hugh Cutting, tenor Andrew Haji, and baritone Joshua Hopkins.

Saturday, April 11, 2 p.m.: The first event that will depart from Davies will take place in the Visitacion Valley Branch of the San Francisco Public Library (SFPL). It will be an afternoon of chamber music performed by SFS musicians. Program details have not been finalized, and there will be no charge for admission.

Sunday, April 12, 2 p.m.: The venue for the second “remote” performance will be the Gunn Theater at the Legion of Honor. This is part of a series of performances to showcase the 1742 Guarneri del Gesù violin on loan to Alexander Barantschik and the San Francisco Symphony from the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Barantschik will perform with cellist Peter Wyrick and Anton Nel on piano. The program will be “framed” by Joseph Haydn and Franz Schubert. The Haydn trio will be Hoboken XV/18 in A major; and the Schubert selection will be his first piano trio, D. 898 in B-flat major. The other works on the program will be Cécile Chaminade’s Opus 89, her “Thème Varié” composed in the key of A major. This will be followed by Carl Czerny’s Opus 33, “La Ricordanza, Variazioni sopra un Tema di Rode,” inspired by the French violinist and composer Pierre Rode.

Sunday, April 12, 2 p.m.: At exactly the same time there will also be a chamber music performance in Davies. The second half of the program will present Johannes Brahms’ Opus 60, his third piano quartet in C minor. The first half will be decidedly different, beginning with Steve Reich’s “Music for Pieces of Wood,” followed by the octet composed by Jean Françaix. The remaining work will be selections from the Danish String Quartet ECM New Series album Last Leaf.

Wednesday, April 15, 7:30 p.m.: The next Shenson Spotlight Series concert will be a recital by violinist Nathan Amaral. This accompanist at the piano will be Sophiko Simsive. This program will be framed by two duo sonatas, beginning with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 378 sonata in B-flat major and concluding with César Franck’s only violin sonata. The “middle” composer will be Francisco Mignone, represented by his second “Valsa de esquina” composition.

Friday, April 17, and Saturday, April 18, 7:30 p.m., and Sunday April 19, 2 p.m.: Simone Young will return to the Davies podium, and cellist Gautier Capuçon will return as concerto soloist. The concerto will be Camille Saint-Saëns’ Opus 33, his first cello concerto in A minor. The “overture” will be the first performance of “The Space Between Stars,” composed by Ella Macens. The second half of the program will serve as a “nod across the street” to the San Francisco Opera House. Young has prepared her own compilation of excerpts from Richard Wagner’s four-opera cycle, Der Ring des Nibelungen (the ring of the Nibelung).

Sunday, April 19, 7:30 p.m.: Violinist Joshua Bell will return to Davies. He has prepared a program of three sonatas: Franz Schubert’s D. 574 in A major, Edvard Grieg’s Opus 45 (his third) in C minor, and Sergei Prokofiev’s Opus 94b (his second) in D major. He will be accompanied at the piano by Shai Wosner.

Saturday, April 25, 2 p.m.: This will be another performance for SFPL. This one will take place at the Merced Branch. It will be another afternoon of chamber music performed by SFS musicians. Program details again have not been finalized, and there will be no charge for admission.

Pianist and conductor Yuja Wang (from the Web page for her SFS performance at the end of April)

Sunday, April 26, 7:30 p.m.: Pianist Yuja Wang will return to Davies. However, she will also serve as the Director of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. She will begin by leading the ensemble in a performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s first (“Classical”) symphony. She will then take to the keyboard while conducting a performance of a suite for piano and orchestra by Alexander Tsfasman. Following the intermission, she will return to Prokofiev with a performance of his Opus 16 (second) piano concerto in G minor.

Next PBO Program to Include Spirituals

Banner for the Web page being discussed

The title of the next program to be presented by the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra is Pearls of Sorrow. As was observed when the season was first announced this past July, it may be the first time that American spirituals will be included on the program. That program will be structured into five episodes, each of which interjects one or more spirituals to “rub shoulders” with works by composers from the Baroque period. Those composers will include both Johann Sebastian Bach and Johann Christoph Bach as well as many others, including Pietro Locatelli, Heinrich Schütz, and Dieterich Buxtehude. The vocalist will be countertenor Reginald Mobley, and Christine Brandes will conduct. The titles of the episodes will be as follows:

1. Trauma
2. Sorrow
3. Pain
4. All My Trials
5. Finding

To borrow a text from Eugene O’Neill, one may describe the overall program as “a long day’s journey into night.”

As usual, this performance will take place in Herbst Theater, located at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. The performance will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, March 13. Ticket prices range from $40 to $125. They may be purchased through a City Box Office Web page, which includes a diagram showing where seats are still available.

Next CBS Program to Explore Aspects of Loss

The Magdalen with the Smoking Flame (painting by Georges de La Tour on the Web page for the concert being announced)

The full title of the next program to be presented by the California Bach Society is On Leaving: Music for Parting and Passage. If the overall theme reflects on loss, longing, and transcendence, the plan is that the music will offer comfort, harmony, and hope. Yuko Tanaka will be the organist, there will be one vocalist, tenor Corey Head, and three instrumental soloists: Stacy Pelinka on flute, David Morris playing Baroque cello, and Farley Pearce on violone.

The program will begin with Max Reger’s setting of the poem by Matthias Claudius whose first line is "Der Mensch lebt und bestehet nur eine kleine Zeit" (Man liveth and endureth but a short time). This is the first of the eight motets in his Opus 138 collection, inspired by the motets of Johann Sebastian Bach. This will be followed by the motet for four unaccompanied voices “Ecce quomodo moritur justus” (see how the just dies), composed by Jacob Handl (Jacobus Gallus) for his Opus Musicum II collection. The first half of the program will then conclude with a motet that is by Bach, the BWV 229 “Komm, Jesu, komm” (come, Jesus, come).

The second half of the program will begin with “Na Ishod” (on leaving) by the Ukrainian composer Galina Grigorjeva. This five-movement composition was inspired by Orthodox chant, complementing the German and Latin selections in the first half of the program. However, the program will conclude by going “back to Bach” with the performance of another one of his motets, “Jesu, meine Freude” (Jesus, my joy) BWV 227.

The San Francisco performance of this program will take place at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, February 27. The venue will be St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, which is located 1111 O’Farrell Street. Individual tickets are available for general admission at $40 with discounted rates for seniors and students. Tickets may also be purchased an advance until midnight of February 26 through a Web page, in which case general admission will be only $35.

Voices of Music Presents a Valentines’ “Rerun”

This afternoon the Voices of Music Sunday Mornings at Ten program presented a rerun of a program entitled Love is in the Air Valentine Special, which was performed three years ago. This turned out to be a marathon of 33 selections from video recordings of past performances, resulting in an overall duration of about three hours. Regardless of what one may think about Valentine’s Day, this was the perfect way to stay indoors and avoid the rainy afternoon!

The entire performance was structured as a YouTube playlist. One simply had to go to the home page for the entire program and click the “Play all” button. YouTube would then automatically advance through the 33 Web sites in the order found on the home page.

Since YouTube has done it for me, I shall not provide readers with a blow-by-blow account of all 33 of the compositions. Rather, I shall call attention to some of my more memorable personal moments. One of these was the surprise that only one of the selections was by Johann Sebastian Bach. Soprano Laura Heimes sang the first aria in the BWV 213 cantata Laßst uns sorgten, laßst uns wachen (let us take care, let us watch over). (“For the record,” as they say, this aria was a revision of one of the arias in the BWV 248 Christmas Oratorio.)

Soprano Anna Dennis preparing to sing “Fairest Isle” (screen shot from the Voices of Music video)

There were also back-to-back performances of two settings of texts by William Shakespeare. Soprano Anna Davis sang “Take, O take those lips away;” and her performance was followed by one of “It was a lover and his lass,” composed by Thomas Morley and sung by Jennifer Ellis Campani. Towards the end of the program, Shakespeare reappears with two compositions by Anthony Holborne, “The Fairie Round” and “Hearts-Ease.” These were flanked on either side by soprano Anna Dennis singing “Fairest Isle” from Henry Purcell’s Z. 628 “semi-opera,” King Arthur.

Bear in mind, however, I am just accounting for my favorites. To be fair, each of the 33 videos is a gem unto itself. There may be some questions about any connection to Valentine’s Day. Nevertheless, all of the selections were irresistible; and that is really all that matters!

SFCA to Celebrate Music for Jewish Traditions

Poster design for next month’s concert (from the Web Page for purchasing tickets)

Next month will see the second of the three programs to be presented this season by San Francisco Choral Artists (SFCA). The title of this program will be L’Chaim! A Celebration of Life, and the theme will be a global perspective on Jewish tradition. Those traditions will be expressed through music of praise and devotion, intimacy, and hard-won hope, inspired by the Biblical psalms and lamentations.

As is often the case, this will be a “past and present” program. The past will be acknowledged through compositions by Salamone Rossi, who served as concertmaster for the court of Mantua from 1587 to 1628, and Felix Mendelssohn from the nineteenth century. The contemporary composers on the program will be Tzvi Avni, Matt Van Brink, Sylke Zimpel, L Peter Deutsch, and Alice Parker. As usual, there will also be world premiere performances of music by Composer-in-Residence Max Marcus and Composer-Not-in-Residence Peter Hilliard.

The San Francisco performance of this program will take place at 4 p.m. on Sunday, March 15. The venue will be the Noe Valley Ministry, which is located at 1021 Sanchez Street. A Web page has been created for online ticket purchases on a pay-what-you-will basis. Tickets at the door will be sold for $35 with a $30 rate for seniors and $15 for those under the age of 30.

Nicholas McGegan Returns to PBO Podium

Banner for the Web page for the program being discussed

Last night Nicholas McGegan returned to Herbst Theatre to lead the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra (PBO) & Chorale in a program of sacred and secular music entitled Baroque Garlands. Each half of the program consisted of a single composition, beginning with the sacred and concluding with the secular. The composer for the first half of the program was George Frideric Handel, followed by Jean-Philippe Rameau in the second half. There were only two vocal soloists, soprano Nola Richardson and tenor Aaron Sheehan.

The Handel selection was HWV 232, a setting of the Latin text of Psalm 110, whose title consists of the first two words, Dixit Dominus (“The Lord said”). Five of the nine movements are choral, and they are interleaved with a rich diversity of solo performances. The second and third movements were sung by countertenor Kyle Sanchez Tingzon and soprano Nola Richardson, respectively. They then joined the vocal quintet in the sixth movement, whose other members were soprano Victoria Fraser, tenor Aaron Sheehan, and bass-baritone Chung-Wai Soong. The penultimate movement was a soprano duo with Tonia D’Amelio joining Richardson. Taken as a whole, this was an engaging journey of diversity, given a delightfully upbeat account by McGegan.

The intermission was followed by Rameau’s “La guirlande, ou Les fleurs enchantée,” described in the program book as an “Acte de ballet with a libretto by Jean-François Marmontel.” There are only two characters in the narrative, Zélide (Richardson) and Myrtil (Sheehan). The “enchantment” is that both characters have garlands that will stay fresh as long as they are faithful to each other. As might be expected, the narrative involves the withering of the garlands and their eventual restoration. The “happy ending” is celebrated with dances by herdsmen,  shepherds, and shepherdesses.

As has been the case so often, the entire evening was carried by the enthusiastic attentiveness of McGegan on the podium. He was as committed to engaging listener attention as he had been over the course of his 34-year tenure as Music Director. (Having also seen him conduct the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, I know this his commitment is not limited to any particular period in music history!) I also appreciated the way in which he prepared a program coupling the contrasting spirits of sacred and secular music. Hopefully, he will continue to visit PBO in future seasons.

Busy March at Two Venues

Next month promises to a busy one, particularly since two organizations will be overlapping twice over the course of that month. One of them, The Lab, has been covered on this site for many years, while the other, Zephyr Symphony is still in its early stages. Where the performance of music is concerned, The Lab will be busier than usual. Zephyr will be more modest, but it will account for two of the three programs remaining in its current season. For reader convenience, the events will be listed in chronological order:

Saturday, March 7, 6 p.m., [update 3/4, rescheduled to Tuesday, March 10, 7:30 p.m.] The Lab: This will be a “dialogue” between two different artists with the shared goal of reframing sound as “both a tool for subverting power and a site of collective possibility.” Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste will repurpose Long Range Acoustic Device technology, which was designed to be used by military and police forces for crowd control. Evicshen will contribute to the performance with his own self-built instruments.

Tickets are now available through the Web page for this event. Those attending will be free to pay what they wish. For those that do not yet know, the venue is located in the Mission at 2948 16th Street, a short walk from the 16th Street Muni station.

[updated February 16, 9:25 a.m. : This performance has been cancelled:

Saturday, March 7, 7:30 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: Following up on the performance of the “Christmas portion” of George Frideric Handel’s HWV 56 oratorio Messiah, Zephyr Symphony will again be joined by the Zephyr Chorus for the performance of Felix Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah. The “title role” will be sung by baritone Andrew Thomas Pardini. The other vocal soloists will be soprano Mary-Hollis Hundley, contralto Leandra Ramm, and tenor Elliot James-Ginn Encarnácion.

A Web page has been created for seat selection. Ticket prices range from $26.06 to $67.76. There is a color-coded map on the Web page showing which seats are available at which prices. Most readers probably know by now that St. Mark’s Lutheran Church is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of the corner of Franklin Street. Doors to the lobby will open half an hour before the beginning of the performance.]

Gwenifer Raymond with her guitar (from the Web page for her performance at The Lab)

Friday, March 20, 8 p.m., The Lab: Guitarist Gwenifer Raymond is based in Brighton (the one “on the other side of the pond”). She will present a full-evening performance entitled Last Night I Heard the Dog Star Bark. According to her Web page, she “has drawn international acclaim for her repurposing of Mississippi blues and John Fahey’s intricate Americana to embody her roots in rural South Wales and her interests in folk horror and the avant garde, inventing a new form dubbed Welsh Primitive.” (This reminds me of “Anything Can Happen Day” from the days of the Mickey Mouse Club!)

Tickets may be purchased in advance for $23 through the Web page for this event. Payment at the door will be $25. Members will be entitled to free or discounted admission.

Saturday, March 21, 7:30 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: The final work on this Zephyr program will be “Après Moi, le Déluge,” a concerto composed by Luna Pearl Woolf for cello and a cappella chorus. This will be complemented by Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “Mass in G minor,” scored for a double choir with four soloists. The Mass setting will be preceded by a Magnificat setting by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina scored for two four-part choirs. Each half of the program will begin with a shorter composition. “Hail, Gladdening Light” by Charles Wood is also scored for a double choir. The second half will begin with a setting of Emma Lazarus’ sonnet engraved at the base of the Statue of Liberty, “The New Colossus,” composed by Saunder Choi.

Saturday, March 21, 8:30 p.m., The Lab: A Danger to Ourselves is the title of the latest album by Lucrecia Dalt. She is a sound artist, whose album includes guitarist David Sylvian and vocalists Juana Molina, Camille Mandoki, and Eliana Joy. Instrumentation is provided by bassist Cyrus Campbell and Chris Jones on saxophone. The second set will also reflect on a recent album, The Patterns Lost to Air, composed and performed by Marielle V. Jakobsons.

Tickets may be purchased in advance for $27 through the Web page for this event. Payment at the door will be $29. Members will be entitled to free or discounted admission.

Saturday, March 28, 8:30 p.m., The Lab: This will also be a two-set program. Moin is a trio that began as a duo. Tom Halstead and Joe Andrews created soundscapes with rapid percussion and interjections of haunted synthesizer. The trio was formed when they were joined by drummer Valentina Magaletti. The second set will be a solo performance by Ava Mendoza, who writes her own songs, which she sings with her own guitar accompaniment.

Tickets may be purchased in advance for $27 through the Web page for this event. Payment at the door will be $29. Members will be entitled to free or discounted admission.