Once again Chamber Music San Francisco (CMSF) will launch its 2023 season in Herbst Theatre next month. As in the past, the full schedule will consist of ten recitals; and, in this season, two of those programs will be Bay Area debuts. Most readers probably know by now that Herbst is located in the Veterans Building on the southwest corner of Van Ness Avenue and McAllister Street. Concerts will alternate between evenings at 8 p.m. and Sunday matinees at 3 p.m. Specifics are as follows:
Saturday, February 11, 8 p.m.: The season will begin with the first Bay Area debut. This will be a recital by the Aris Quartet, which was founded in Frankfurt in 2009. The members are violinists Anna Katharina Wildermuth and Noémi Zipperling, violist Caspar Vinzens, and cellist Lukas Sieber. Their program will be distinguished by the seldom performed Opus 27 (first) string quartet by Edvard Grieg. The first half of the program will couple two more familiar offerings: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 465 in C major (often called the “Dissonance” due to the enigmatic progressions in the opening measures) and Felix Mendelssohn’s Opus 80 in F minor.
Saturday, February 25, 8 p.m.: Pianist Olga Kern has been a CMSF favorite, at least for the many seasons that I have attended! During the pandemic, she was one of the artists selected for the 2021 season of five online videos. Next month she will return to Herbst to resume “business as usual.” Her program has not yet been finalized, but she plans to perform two compositions by Sergei Rachmaninoff: the Opus 36 (second) sonata in B-flat major and the Opus 42, which is entitled “Variations on a Theme of Corelli.” The theme is actually not by Arcangelo Corelli. Rather, it is the “Folia” theme that dates back as least as far as the middle of the sixteenth century. (Rachmaninoff was a virtuoso pianist and a composer, not a specialist in music history!)
Sunday, March 5, 3 p.m.: Violinists Paul Huang and Danbi Um will share the program. Each of them will perform a solo sonata accompanied by Amy Yang at the piano. One of them will play Gabriel Fauré’s Opus 13 (first) sonata in A major; and the other will play Ernest Bloch’s second sonata, given the title “Poème Mystique.” (Who will play which has not yet been finalized.) The remainder of the program will consist of the Opus 71 G minor suite by Moritz Moszkowski, scored for two violins and piano, Amy Barlowe’s “Hebraique Elegie” for two violins, and Pablo de Sarasate’s Opus 33 “Navarra,” originally composed for two violins and orchestra.
Tuesday, March 14, 8 p.m.: Stella Chen will present a violin recital, accompanied at the piano by Henry Kramer. Her program will begin with Claude Debussy’s only violin sonata, composed in the key of G minor shortly before his death. This will be followed by Franz Schubert’s D. 934 “fantasy” in C major for violin and piano. The second half of the program will begin with Grieg’s Opus 13 (second) sonata in G major, followed by a rousing concluding performance of Pablo de Sarasate’s Opus 25 “Carmen Fantasy.”
Sunday, March 19, 3 p.m.: Pianist Angela Hewitt will return with a “two centuries” program. The first half will begin with a selection of sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti (not yet finalized), followed by Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 811, the sixth and last of his “English” suites. The second half of the program will be devoted entirely to Johannes Brahms’ Opus 5 (third) sonata in F minor.
Sunday, April 2, 3 p.m.: The Tetzlaff Trio has performed several times for San Francisco Performances; but, unless I am mistaken, this will be their first recital to be hosted by CMSF. The name of the trio refers to violinist Christian Tetzlaff and his sister Tanja. They have given trio performances with different pianists; and, on this occasion, the pianist will be Kiveli Dörken, a student of Lars Vogt, who performed in the first Tetzlaff Trio recitals. The second half of the program will be devoted entirely to Schubert’s D. 898 (first) piano trio in B-flat major. The program will begin with the third of the Opus 1 trios by Ludwig van Beethoven, composed in the key of C minor. This will be followed by Antonín Dvořák's Opus 26 (second) trio in G minor.
Sunday, April 16, 3 p.m.: Pianist John Nakamatsu will return to CMSF to give a solo recital. Like Hewitt, he will devote the second half of his program to Brahms’ Opus 5 sonata. The first half will begin with two of Frédéric Chopin’s impromptus, Opus 29 in A-flat major and Opus 51 in G-flat major. These will followed by four other impromptus collected by Franz Schubert and subsequently cataloged as D. 899.
Saturday, April 22, 8 p.m.: Pianists Greg Anderson and Elizabeth Joy Roe presented their last CMSF program on February 15, 2020, making their recital one of the last events before the lockdown conditions were imposed to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Almost all of their performances involved their own innovative twists on familiar repertoire selections. For their return visit, only two compositions will be performed as they were first written. The program will begin with Mozart’s K. 448 sonata for two pianos in D major; and the other “straight” selection will be “Silent Woods,” one of the movements from Dvořák's Opus 68 suite From the Bohemian Forest. The rest of the program will be devoted to what I have previously called “more diverting offerings.”
Saturday, April 29, 8 p.m.: The penultimate program of the season will be the other Bay Area debut performance. Furthermore, the performers will again be the members of a string quartet. The ensemble is the Quatuor Arod, whose players are violinists Jordan Victoria and Alexandre Vu, violist Tanguy Parisot, and cellist Jérémy Garbarg. They are probably the first classical music group to be named after a fictitious horse, the one that Legolas rides in J. R. R. Tolkien The Lord of the Rings! The one composer they share with the Aris Quartet is Mendelssohn. While that ensemble began the season with his final quartet, Quatuor Arod will play the first of his two Opus 44 quartets, composed in the key of D major. The program will begin with Joseph Haydn’s Hoboken III/35 quartet in F minor. This is the fifth of the six quartets in the Opus 20 collection and one of the three of those quartets to conclude with a fugue (in this particular case a fugue with two subjects). The program will conclude with Schubert’s D. 810 string quartet in D minor, whose second movement is a set of variations on the theme of the D. 531 song “Der Tod und das Mädchen” (Death and the maiden).
Sunday, May 14, 3 p.m.: Cellist Alisa Weilerstein had been scheduled to present a duo recital with pianist Inon Barnatan for CMSF on April 5, 2020. That recital will now conclude the CMSF season. The program will be devoted to Beethoven’s cello sonatas, but the specific selections have not yet been announced.
Tickets for the entire season may be purchased online through a PayPal Web page. The price will be $370. There are also options for miniseries of four or more concerts. A Web page has been created for taking advantage of the miniseries option. (It also includes a hyperlink for full-season subscriptions.) Finally, the CMSF home page has a summary of all of the programs, each of which includes a hyperlink for single-concert purchases. Those that do not wish to order online can exercise all of these options by calling 415-392-4400.
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