MTT and SFS to Premiere New Steven Mackey Work

Following this month of visiting conductors, Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) will return to the podium of the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) to present the world premiere of a composition by Steven Mackey commissioned by SFS to honor MTT. The title of the piece is “Portals, Scenes and Celebrations;” and it is the sixth work Mackey has written for MTT. He seems to have a predilection for conjunctions, since the titles of two of the other works are “Lost and Found” and “Tuck and Roll.”

Violinist Gil Shaham (photograph by Luke Ratray, from the SFS event page for this concert)

Mackey’s piece will serve as the “overture” to a program with the “standard” overture-concerto-symphony format. The concerto soloist will be Gil Shaham, who appears regularly with SFS and has been accompanied by MTT on many occasions. The concerto selection will be Sergei Prokofiev’s Opus 19 (first) violin concerto in D major. The symphony selection will be an MTT favorite, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Opus 36 (fourth) symphony in F minor.

This concert will be given three performances, all at 8 p.m. on Thursday, February 7, Friday, February 8, and Saturday, February 9. There will be an Inside Music talk given by Peter Grunberg that will begin one hour before the performance. Doors to the Davies lobbies open fifteen minutes before the talk begins. Ticket prices range from $20 to $156. They may be purchased online through the event page for this program on the SFS Web site, by calling 415-864-6000, or by visiting the Davies Box Office, whose entrance is on the south side of Grove Street between Van Ness Avenue and Franklin Street. The event page also has an embedded sound file of KDFC’s Rik Malone’s podcast about the Tchaikovsky symphony, as well as files of sound clips from previous SFS performances of both that symphony and the Prokofiev concerto. Flash must be enabled for both streamed content and online ticket purchases. The Box Office is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday, from noon to 6 p.m. on Saturday, and two hours prior to Sunday performances.

In addition, these performances will be preceded by the next Katherine Hanrahan Open Rehearsal. This special behind-the-scenes experience begins at 8:30 a.m. on Thursday, January 31, with coffee and complimentary doughnuts, followed by a half-hour introductory talk by Grunberg at 9 a.m. The rehearsal itself begins at 10 a.m.; and, of course, the pieces rehearsed are at the conductor’s discretion. General admission is $30 with $40 for reserved seats in the Premiere Orchestra section and Rear Boxes and $45 for seating in the Side Boxes and the Loge. Tickets may be purchased online through a separate event page.