Wednesday, July 24, 2019

SFCM: November, 2019

Ironically, when the Calendar for the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) advances to November, events appear for which much, if not all, of the program details have been established. Presumably, this is because these concerts present the results of term-long projects that have been defined before classes begin. Given how many other performances will be taking place at other venues in November, it seems desirable to provide a heads-up on when the results of these projects will be ready for presentation before audiences. Here are the specifics for the two projects that have been planned:

Sunday, November 3, 2 p.m., Concert Hall: The SFCM Baroque Ensemble, co-directed by Corey Jamason and Elisabeth Reed, will present its annual Fall Baroque Concert. Appropriate to the season, they will play the third and fourth concertos from Antonio Vivaldi’s Opus 8 collection, Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione (the contest between harmony and invention), whose first four concertos are best known as The Four Seasons. The concertos that will be performed are those that represent autumn and winter. In a similar vein the program will begin with Jean-Baptiste Lully’s Ballet des Saisons, which includes arias setting texts by Isaac de Benserade. Somewhat in the same spirit, the program will also include selected movement from Jean-Féry Rebel’s score for the ballet Les Élémens (the elements). Additional vocal selections by Vivaldi and George Frideric Handel have not yet been finalized.

Thursday, November 21, and Friday, November 22, 7:30 p.m., Concert Hall: SFCM Opera will present an imaginative coupling of one-act offerings. The first will be Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 486 comic Singspiel “Der Schauspieldirektor” (the impresario). Mozart composed this comedy in 1786, by which time he had written enough operas to appreciate the problems in dealing with prima donnas. Managing self-important individuals is also at the heart of the Prologue for Richard Strauss’ Opus 60 opera Ariadne auf Naxos. As a result, the evening, taken as a whole, makes it clear that “arts management” had not changed very much over the course of 130 years. Curt Pajer, Musical and Managing Director of Opera, will conduct; and specifics regarding staging have not yet been announced.

In addition, there will be two concerts for which program details have not yet been announced:
As always, when further details become available, they will be found on the Performance Calendar Web page at the SFCM Web site closer to the scheduled dates. The above hyperlinks will lead to concert-specific Web pages. The individual event pages will specify whether a concert is free and/or whether a reservation is required. If there will be a charge for admission, there will be a hyperlink to a Web page for purchasing tickets. (There will also be hyperlinks for making reservations for free concerts.) Note that, because reservations are recommended, there are separate hyperlinks for the two dates of the opera program. For those who do not already know, the SFCM building is located at 50 Oak Street, between Van Ness Avenue and Franklin Street, a short walk from the Van Ness Muni Station. 

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