Choices for May 1, 2022

Last year ended with a pair of “busy weekend” articles, after which the flow of activity tended to abate somewhat. However, next month will begin with more choices than usual, none of which involve a maypole or memories of “the Revolution.” Because it is the beginning of a new month, the first entry will include plans for the remainder of the month. Also, if necessary, this page will be updated with notifications of changes on the “mirror” Facebook site. The events currently scheduled for Sunday, May 1, are as follows:

3 p.m., Old First Presbyterian Church: Old First Concerts (O1C) will host Music of the Americas. This will be the eighteenth year of the Juliet McComas Keyboard Marathon presented by the Community Music Center (CMC). Fourteen CMC keyboard faculty artists will present a program of the works of eighteen American, Latin, and African American composers representing wide-ranging periods and styles. Three of the composers are currently active in the Bay Area: Jon Jang, Bruce Nalezny, and Betty Wong. O1C events will continue to be “hybrid,” allowing both live streaming and seating in the Old First Presbyterian Church at 1751 Sacramento Street on the southwest corner of Van Ness Avenue. Seating will remain limited to 100 tickets, all being sold for $25 (no reduced rate for seniors or students). Tickets may be purchased through this concert’s event page. The remaining events of the month will be as follows with hyperlinks attached to the date and time of each the performances:

• Friday, May 6, 8 p.m.: Violinist Patrick Galvin will return to O1C. He will be accompanied at the piano by Jennifer Hou. His program will include the duo versions of Arvo Pärt’s “Fratres” and Ernest Chausson’s Opus 25 “Poème.” The program will begin with “Souvenir,” the first in a collection of six pieces by Jean Sibelius published as his Opus 79. This will be followed by Nathan Milstein’s arrangement of Frédéric Chopin’s posthumously published solo piano nocturne in C-sharp minor.
• Friday, May 13, 8 p.m.: Twin sisters Clara and Marie Becker will present a program of music composed for piano four-hands. They will begin with two selections by Robert Schumann, his D. 813 set of variations in A-flat major and the D. 940 fantasy in F minor, which is one of the most iconic compositions in the four-hand literature. This will be followed by Felix Mendelssohn’s Op. Posth. 92, an Allegro brillant in A major. Antonín Dvořák’s orchestral Slavonic dances were also published in versions for four-hand performance, and the Becker twins will perform three selections from the Opus 72 collection. The program will conclude with a four-hand rendering of “Vltava” (the Moldau) the second of the six pieces that Bedřich Smetana collected under the title Má vlast (my fatherland).
• Saturday, May 14, 7:30 p.m.: Harpist Amelia Romano will present a program of music, most (if not all) of which has been arranged for her instrument. The repertoire will range from one of the keyboard sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti (K. 368 in A major) to Leo Brouwer’s arrangements of two Beatles songs, “She’s Leaving Home” and “Penny Lane.” Romano will be joined by two guest artists, trumpeter Matthew Ebisuzaki and guitarist Zach Donaldson.
• Sunday, May 15, 4 p.m.: The Ives Collective, led by Susan Freier on both violin and viola and cellist Stephen Harrison, will present a program consisting of a trio, a quartet, and a quintet. The trio will be Rebecca Clarke’s piano trio in E-flat minor. The quartet will be Benjamin Britten “Phantasy Quartet,” featuring oboist Kyle Bruckmann. The quintet will be Edward Elgar’s Opus 84 piano quintet in A minor.
• Friday, May 20, 8 p.m.: The Friction Quartet of violinists Otis Harriel and Kevin Rogers, violist Rachyl Martinez, and cellist Doug Machiz will present the world premiere of “La terre est bleue comme une orange” by Geoffrey Gordon. This will be followed by two other recently-composed works. “El Correcaminos” by Nicolas Benavides will be followed by Mario Godoy’s “Attention Economy.”
• Sunday, May 22, 4 p.m.: The May calendar will conclude with a solo piano recital by Daniel Schreiner. He will present West Coast premiere performances of two compositions, “bluedream” by Brittany J. Green and “Three Short Dreams” by Ramin Roshandel. Featured composers from the twentieth century will include Erik Satie, John Cage, and György Ligeti.

4 p.m., Noe Valley Ministry: Prior to their Old First performance, the Friction Quartet will give a performance with pianist  Sarah Cahill. The program will consist of three quintets and one string quartet. The latter will be Dvořák’s Opus 96 “American” quartet. The quintets will be a three-movement composition by Tania León entitled “Ethos,” written in 2013, a 2012 piece by Timo Andres inspired by the works of Robert Schumann, and Max Stoffregen’s tone poem entitled “The Gila: River, Mesa and Mountain.” The Noe Valley Ministry is located at 1021 Sanchez Street, between 23rd Street and Elizabeth Street, a short walk from the Muni stops at the corner of 24th Street and Church Street. Tickets for this concert are being sold through the Noe Music event page. General admission is $40. Those that login with an electronic mail address may be eligible for discounts, but others may prefer to process the order through a guest login.

4 p.m., Congregation Sha’ar Zahav: At exactly the same time, Congregation Sha’ar Zahav will host the final program in the 22nd season of Music in the Mishkan. The regular performers for the season have been Music Director Randall Weiss on violin and pianist Marilyn Thomson. They will be joined by violist Natalia Vershilova and cellist Matthew Linamen in a performance of Gabriel Fauré’s Opus 15 (first) quartet in C minor. The program will begin with Alexander Krein’s “Elegy,” which will be followed by the first of Ludwig van Beethoven’s two Opus 70 piano trios, this one composed in the key of D minor. Congregation Sha’ar Zahav is located at 290 Dolores Street at the northwest corner of 16th Street. Tickets for the general public are $25, but members of Congregation Sha’ar Zahav will be admitted for $20. Tickets may be purchased in advance with a credit card by calling Congregation Sha’ar Zahav at 415-861-6932. They may also be acquired online through a Web page, which also allows for additional donations to Sha'ar Zahav.

[added 4/24, 9:35 a.m.:

4 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: A third concert to take place at the same time with be the Pious & Profane program prepared by American Bach Soloists. This will consist of both secular and sacred music from the Early Baroque period in Italy, with both genres represented by compositions by Claudio Monteverdi. The secular selections will be taken from his eighth book of madrigals. This is the longest of the nine books and the only one to be given a title: Madrigali guerrieri e amorosi (madrigals of war and love). There will be two “war” madrigals: “Or ch’l ciel e la terra” (now that heaven and earth) based on a sonnet by Petrarch, and “Combattimento de Tancredi e Clorinda” (the battle between Tancred and Clorinda), taken from Book XII of Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata (Jerusalem liberated). The “love” madrigal will be “Altri canti de Marte” (let others sing of Mars). The sacred selections will be the six-voice Magnificat setting taken from the 1610 Vespers music and the setting of Psalm 112, “Beatus vir” (blessed is the man). The other composers to be included in the program will be Giovanni Gabrieli, Biagio Marini, Giovanni Legrenzi, and Isabella Leonarda. St. Mark’s is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just west of Franklin Street. The eastbound Geary Bus (number 38) stops within a block of the church after it leaves Geary Boulevard to proceed along O’Farrell. There are also nearby stops for buses on Van Ness Avenue. Ticket prices are $101, $77, $56, and $39, with seating for the disabled priced at both $101 and $39. All tickets may be purchased through an ABS Web page. That Web page includes an interactive display for checking where seats are available in each of the four sections. The checkout process will include a display of safety policies, and an agreement must be affirmed before the transaction is completed.]