Chinese New Year at Davies will Come Earlier

The annual Chinese New Year Concert & Banquet presented by the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) will come significantly earlier this year. While the Year of the Boar was celebrated last year in Davies Symphony Hall on February 16, festivities for the Year of the Mouse will take place on Saturday, February 1. This year’s celebration will mark the twentieth anniversary of SFS hosting this signature heritage event, in which traditions of both East and West are joined through the universal language of music. As was the case last year, the doors to the Davies lobby will open for a pre-concert Festival Reception at 4 p.m., and the concert itself will begin at 5 p.m. The glamorous and celebratory Emerald Banquet will follow the concert, beginning at 7 p.m. in the Zellerbach Rehearsal Hall, whose entrance is in the rear of Davies at 300 Franklin Street.

This year’s conductor will be Perry So, making his SFS debut. As usual the program will combine traditional folk music with works by Asian composers. This year’s concert will feature the United States premiere of Huang Ruo’s recently-completed “Folk Songs for Orchestra.” The program will also include “Red Silk Dance” by the more familiar composer Bright Sheng, which will feature pianist Sa Chen as soloist. Chen made her SFS debut in 2015, performing Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Opus 18 (second) piano concerto in C minor. There will also be soloists on traditional Chinese instruments. Guilian Liu will play pipa in Wu Zuqiang’s arrangement of “Moonlit Night on Spring River;” and Hu Jianbing will be sheng soloists in Yan Hai-Deng’s arrangement of “Jin Diao.” Finally, the Loong Mah Sing See Wui dance company will open the program during a performance of “Martial Artists Welcome Spring” by Phoon Yew Tien.

During the hour before the concert begins, all of the lobbies will offer a wide diversity of family entertainments. These will include arts and crafts appropriate to the season, lion dancing, games, and, for those wishing to snack, food, desserts, and tea bars. As in the past, the Emerald Banquet will be catered by McCalls.

Davies is located at 201 Van Ness Avenue, and the main entrance is the Box Office lobby on Grove Street, about half a block to the west of Van Ness Avenue. Ticket prices in which seating is currently available range from $35 to $115. They may be purchased online through the Select Seats Web page for this program on the SFS Web site, by calling 415-864-6000, or by visiting the Box Office. Online seat selection requires that Flash be enabled. The Box Office is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday and from noon to 6 p.m. on Saturday.

Tickets for the Lunar New Year Imperial Dinner are sold separately. As of this writing, there is only limited availability. Those interested in attending may call the SFS Volunteer Council at 415-503-5500 for more information.