SFS 2025–26: Returning Conductors

Herbert Blomstedt taking a bow from the podium of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra (photograph by Amrei-Marie, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license)

It has taken more than a little time, but this morning I can continue examining the works that will be performed by the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) for the Orchestral Series of the 2025–26 season. As readers can probably guess, there is some overlap with the programs listed in the first article, which accounted for performances of “Works by Living Composers.” Today I wish to examine the list of “Returning Conductors” in the Orchestral Series. Four of those conductors were involved with those “Works by Living Composers” programs. It is worth singling them out as follows:

1. September 18–20: James Gaffigan
2. October 3–5: Gustavo Gimeno
3. May 22–24: Cristian Măcelaru
4. June 25–27: Stéphane Denève

The remaining returning conductors will be listed in alphabetical order as follows:

• Harry Bicket: February 5–7
• Herbert Blomstedt: May 15–17
• Karina Canellakis: November 6–8
• Edward Gardner: January 15–17
• Jane Glover: December 5–6
• Manfred Honeck: February 26 and 27 and March 1
• Philippe Jordan: March 26–28
• Bernard Labadie: April 9–11
• Andrés Orozco-Estrada: March 20–22
• Donald Runnicles: September 26–28
• Dima Slobodeniouk: May 8–9
• Jaap van Zweden: January 29–31 and February 19–21
• Simone Young: April 17–19

Many (most?) readers probably know that Blomstedt is the SFS Conductor Laureate, having previously served as Music Director from 1985 to 1995 (meaning that he left shortly before my wife and I made our move from Singapore to Palo Alto). My account of his last visit to SFS appeared on this site this past January 30; and, as usual, I could not have been more satisfied with the performance. He will not be returning until May of next year, when his entire program will be devoted to Gustav Mahler’s ninth symphony. I am already looking forward to the occasion!

I am also glad to see Runnicles’ return, having enjoyed him during his tenure with the San Francisco Opera. He has been keeping busy following his departure and is now Chief Conductor Designate of the Dresden Philharmonic, Music Director of Deutsche Oper Berlin, and Principal Guest Conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. He will also be performing Mahler during his SFS visit, accounting for “the other end of the time-line” with the first symphony. In this case, however, early Mahler will be coupled with one of the early efforts of Alban Berg. His Seven Early Songs set was composed when he was still studying under Arnold Schoenberg.

It should go without saying that all of these performances will take place in Davies Symphony Hall, which is located at 201 Van Ness Avenue and fills an entire city block. The other boundaries are Grove Street (north), Hayes Street (south), and Franklin Street (west). The main entrance (which is also the entrance to the Box Office) is on Grove Street, roughly halfway down the block. Tickets will go on sale on July 19, after which they should be available for purchase online, by calling 415-503-5351, or by visiting the Box Office in the Davies lobby.

Kenny Dorham in the Bronx on Resonance

Readers familiar with this site probably know of the significant role played by Resonance Records in releasing albums to preserve and promote the art and legacy of jazz performance. If my archives are correct, I have been following the label since 2019, when I wrote about Musical Prophet: The Expanded 1963 New York Studio Sessions, a three-CD album of recording sessions led by Eric Dolphy on July 1 and 3 of 1963. This past February I received word of three new albums that would be released this month; and, as has been the case in my past articles, each of them deserves to be examined individually.

Cover of the album being discussed (from its Amazon.com Web page)

This morning I Iistened to Blue Bossa in the Bronx: Live from the Blue Morocco. This album will be released this coming Friday; and, as is so often the case, Amazon.com has already created a Web page for processing pre-orders. Hard bop trumpeter Kenny Dorham leads a combo, whose other members are Sonny Red on alto saxophone, pianist Cedar Walton, Paul Chambers on bass, and drummer Denis Charles. The tracks were recorded in 1967, and no specific date is provided in any of the text accompanying the album. I described the Dolphy album as “85 minutes of material that has not been previously released;” and this one falls a bit short of 75 minutes.

One of the things I particularly like about Dorham is that he knew how to share the spotlight, so to speak. I came to know Chambers through his work with Miles Davis, but there was no shortage of listening opportunities on this album. Most important is that his bowing technique was right up there with the bass section in a symphony orchestra. (His teacher was Gaston Brohan, Principal Bass for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.) On the “front line” Dorham is certainly generous in the solo time he gives to Red; and Walton was one of the giants of the Jazz Messengers, whose inventions were consistently engaging.

The only real downside is the recording technique. Mind you, in the overall history of jazz performance, this has probably happened more often than not. Those of us that really try to focus our listening skills have learned to take what we can get. I got the best I could and came away with enough satisfaction to look forward to further listening encounters with this album.

SF Phil to Conclude Season with Groupmuse

The final concert in the 2024–2025 season of the San Francisco Philharmonic (SF Phil) will be a Groupmuse Night Out program. That means that tickets will be available through a Groupmuse event page, where “Supermusers” will be entitled to the $12 admission rate, rather than the $18 charge for all others. The performance will take place in Herbst Theatre, located at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. It will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 26.

Ani Bukujian and Jessica Bejarano on the poster for the final SF Phil concert of the season (from the Groupmuse event page)

Music Director Jessica Bejarano will wrap up the season with one of the most familiar symphonies in the repertoire, Antonín Dvořák’s Opus 95 symphony in E minor given the title “From the New World,” now numbered as his ninth symphony. In the first half of the program Ani Bukujian will be the violin soloist in Samuel Barber’s violin concerto. Bejarano will get things off to a rousing start with the instrumental Bacchanale from Camille Saint-Saëns’ opera Samson and Delilah. The run time should be about 90 minutes.

Kronos to Present Tenth Festival in Two Weeks

The annual music festival presented by the Kronos Quartet will begin much earlier than it did last year. Leader David Harrington on first violin and cellist Paul Wiancko will by joined by two new members, Gabriela Díaz on second violin and violist Ayane Kozasa. This will be the first Festival to take place under the leadership of Ann-Marie Daniels, the new Managing Director of the Kronos Performing Arts Association.

Poster design for this year’s festival

Once again, there will be three concert performances taking place at the SFJAZZ Center. The title for this season will be Good Medicine, and the programs will include five world premieres. There will also be arrangements by Jacob Garchik of Nina Simone’s delivery of the song “For All We Know” by J. Fred Coots and Sun Ra’s “Outer Spaceways, Inc.” The recitals will take place at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, April 25, and Saturday, April 26, and at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 27. In addition, during the Festival Ellen Reid’s free SOUNDWALK installation will return to Golden Gate Park.

Ticketing will again be handled by the SFJAZZ Center on a performance-by-performance basis. There will be reserved seating for all three of the evening concerts with prices ranging from $20 to $65. Tickets may also be purchased by calling 866-920-5299 or by visiting the Box Office on the ground floor of the SFJAZZ Center. The SFJAZZ Center is located at 201 Franklin Street, on the northwest corner of Fell Street.

Quatuor Diotima Celebrates Boulez Centenary

Pierre Boulez working with the members of Quatuor Diotima in 2010 (photograph by Gravrand Marion, courtesy of PENTATONE)

This coming Friday PENTATONE will release its latest album of music performed by Quatuor Diotima. The members of this ensemble are violinists Yun-Peng Zhao and Léo Marillier, Franck Chevalier on viola, and cellist Alexis Descharmes. In the past they have recorded quartet music by György Ligeti and Anton Bruckner, and the new album is devoted entirely to the “Livre pour quatuor” composed by Pierre Boulez.

This new release was clearly timed to celebrate the centenary of that composer’s birth on March 26, 1925. He composed the quartet between 1948 and 1949 at a time when he was forging his own path into serial techniques inspired by the Second Viennese School of Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg, and Anton Webern. It was structured in six movements; but, when it was first performed by the Arditti Quartet at the end of March of 1985, the fourth movement was not included in the performance. That movement would only be completed after the Boulez’ death when, in 2018, composer Philippe Manoury worked with Jean-Louis Leleu to prepare an entire performing version. The new Diotima album provides the world premiere of “Livre pour quatuor” in its entirety.

As an undergraduate majoring in mathematics, I took an enthusiastic interest in the serial techniques of the Second Viennese School, which were grounded in the field of combinatorics. Accounting for why the pitch class of every note was where it was came to be an engaging pastime. Listening to the disposition of those pitch classes on score pages was another matter. Ultimately, I reconciled myself to the hard truth that an elegant mathematical construct did not necessarily make for an engaging listening experience.

This may have been due, in some part, to my hanging out with music majors at Boston University. I remember a bull session in which we were discussing different approaches to atonality. I would often interject with the ways in which those approaches were grounded in combinatory analysis. On one occasion one of the music students burst out, “You want to know what will be the future of music? TRIADS!” It was only a few weeks later that I first encountered the music of Philip Glass!

Now I am back to thinking about Boulez again, after recently listening to his piano music on Tamara Stefanovich’s Organized Delirium album. It may not be like “noodle soup going down the drain” (the way a New York Times reviewer once described a piece by Morton Feldman); but each of the individual movements comes across as (in the words of Wozzeck in Alban Berg’s opera) “one thing after the other.” Mind you, the Diotima players clearly do their best to bring expressiveness to the “marks on paper;” but there is only so much an attentive listener can take before bursting out “Enough already!”

AVIE Records Releases Easter Album

Cover of the album being discussed (from its Amazon.com Web page)

Today AVIE Records released a new album anticipating the celebration of Easter. The first half of the album presents a performance of Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 249 Easter Oratorio. This will be followed by the BWV 243 Magnificat.

Local readers will probably be pleased to see that, on this recording, Nicholas McGegan is conducting the Orchestra and Chorus of Cantata Collective. The vocal soloists will be soprano Nola Richardson, countertenor Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, tenor Thomas Cooley,  and baritone Harrison Hintzsche. All recording took place at the First Congregational Church of Berkeley a little over a year ago during March 18–21.

It is also worth nothing that McGegan wrote an accompanying essay for the booklet included with the compact disc release. This should all be of interest to Bay Area readers. Those not familiar with his past performances should take the time to get to experience his approach to the sacred music composed by Bach.

SFP: Plans for 2025 Gift Concert

Tickets are now available for the annual Gift Concert recital presented by San Francisco Performances (SFP). The “gift” is that subscribers and donors are entitled to tickets at no charge. However, they are now available for seating by the general public in the Orchestra and Boxes at the price of $45. As usual, they may be purchased online through an SFP Web page or by calling 415-392-2545. Remaining tickets will be available at the door with a 50% discount for students and 20% off for seniors.

Violinist Geneva Lewis (from the SFP Web page for purchasing tickets)

This year’s recitalist will be violinist Geneva Lewis, whose parents are from the United States and New Zealand. She will be accompanied by American pianist Evren Ozel. She has prepared an imaginative program that will present works by both husband and wife in the Schumann family. In the first half of the program, she will play Clara Schumann’s Opus 22 set of three Romances. This will be complemented in the second half by another set of three works of this genre, this time composed by Robert Schumann and published as his Opus 94. The entire program will be framed by sonatas from two different centuries. The opening selection will be Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 301 sonata in G major, and the recital will conclude with César Franck’s A major sonata. The center of the program will also be a sonata, this time by the living composer Valentyn Silvestrov, who gave his sonata the title “Post Scriptum.”

This concert will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 22. It will take place in Herbst Theatre, whose entrance is on the ground floor of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue, located on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. This venue is excellent for public transportation, since that corner has Muni bus stops for both north-south and east-west travel.

A Splendid Conclusion to 2024/25 PBO Season

Avi Stein on the banner for the Web page for last night’s performance

Last night the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra (PBO) concluded its 2024/25 season with a program led by Avi Stein, Associate Organist and Chorus Master for Trinity Church Wall Street. He is the final candidate for the next Music Director; and, from a personal point of view, he is the one that left the strongest impressions, all of which were positive. The title of the program was Tout de Suite, which reflected on instrumental music with multiple movements.

The intermission was flanked on either side by such multi-movement works by the two leading composers of the Baroque period (both born in 1685), Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel. The Bach selection was BWV 1068, the third of his orchestral suites, composed in the key of D major. This is best known for both its dazzling display of trumpet work and the second (Air) movement, which is the only one performed without those trumpets. Stein clearly knew that this was just about as old a chestnut as one can find, but his attentive conducting endowed the performance with an engaging personality, particularly in the execution of the livelier dance movements (not to mention the unforgettable opening fanfare). That stimulating rhetoric spilled over the intermission into the performance of Handel’s HWV 328 concerto grosso in D minor, the tenth of the twelve pieces in his Opus 6 collection.

Stein compiled a “Suite de théâtre” for his final selection. He collected individual pieces from six works by Jean-Philippe Rameau for theatrical performances. This ran the risk of coming across as “one thing after another.” Nevertheless, the excerpt from Les Boréades provided the most engaging music for bassoon I have ever encountered; and, if the reader will hold back a groan, the two piccolos in the final movement were a real hoot!

The program began with the noble effort of Johann Georg Pisendel to compile for performance Les caractères de la danse, a collection of dance movements composed by Jean-Féry Rebel. Stein’s opening gesture was a bit rough; but he managed to get “into the groove” almost immediately. This was the more vulnerable “one thing after another” offering; but one of the movements involved a ravishing duo for flute and second violin that made the entire journey worth taking.

Where my own personal biases are concerned, I have no trouble asserting that this was the most engaging evening of the entire season.

Henryk Górecki’s String Quartet Music

Cover of the album being discussed (from its Amazon.com Web page)

Early this month Chandos released a two-CD album of the complete works for string quartet composed by  Henryk Górecki performed by the Silesian Quartet. Coincidentally, when Canadian pianist Jan Lisiecki gave his latest San Francisco Performances recital towards the end of last month, the program he prepared consisting entirely of preludes included two by Górecki, the first and last in his Opus 1. All of the quartet pieces were composed much later in his career, and are decidedly different.

Most important is that a string quartet offers a much wider palette of sonorities. In many ways, Górecki expresses himself more through those sonorities than through thematic interplay. This is not to say that he avoids themes; and, like Béla Bartók, he took great interest in folksongs, particularly those from Kurpie, a region northwest of Warsaw. Indeed, many of the “voices” in his quartet compositions tend to evoke the spirit of how those songs were sung.

This makes for a significant departure in quartet rhetoric, even from the folk-inspired passages in the Bartók quartets. Górecki can also command a rhetoric of stillness, which may have been inspired by Bartók’s “night music” but takes it to an even darker setting. Nevertheless, there is considerable rhetorical breadth as the attentive listener navigates through each of the three quartets. Having enjoyed Górecki’s piano music in a recital, I would be only too happy to listen to a recital by a string quartet that has taken him into their repertoire.

Ackamoor Returning to SF for World Premiere

Saxophonist Idris Ackamoor leading his combo (from the Web page for his performance at The Lab)

Some readers may recall that, at the beginning of this year Idris Ackamoor announced a touring schedule that would include for performances within the San Francisco city limits. Each of these were scheduled to take place at a different venue. This month the third of those performances will take place at The Lab.

The program was planned to support the world premiere of the double vinyl album Artistic Being. Ackamoor created original material for this album to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his Afrofuturist combo, The Pyramids. Those performers will be joined by guest artists Rhodessa Jones and Danny Glover. The performance of the music for Artistic Being was given its world premiere at The Lab last year.

This year that same venue will host a record release performance. This will take place on Saturday, April 19, beginning at 8 p.m. Tickets will be sold for $27 and may be purchased online through a Dice Web page. For those unfamiliar with the venue, The Lab is located in the Mission at 2948 16th Street. This is particularly convenient for those using public transportation, since it is a short walk to the corner of 16th Street and Mission Street. Busses stop at that corner for both north-south and east-west travel, and downstairs there is a station for the BART line running under Mission Street.

Bartlett’s Uneven Shenson Spotlight Piano Recital

Pianist Martin James Bartlett (from his San Francisco Symphony event page)

Last night in Davies Symphony Hall, this year’s Shenson Spotlight Series presented by the San Francisco Symphony continued with a solo piano recital by Martin Janes Bartlett. He prepared a program that spanned from the eighteenth century (music which predated the piano) to the twentieth. The major work on the program was Robert Schumann’s Opus 15 Kinderszenen (scenes from childhood), a collection of thirteen short pieces composed in 1838.

This is one of those works that has been encountered by just about anyone that took serious piano lessons. (My own coaching came from Jake Heggie with input from Johana Harris.) Sadly, Bartlett seemed to be more interested in speed, rather than phrasing, leaving little room for expressiveness in any of the thirteen movements. When he was not overplaying his approach to pace, he turned to dynamics; and his account of Franz Liszt’s transcription of the “Liebestod” episode at the conclusion of Richard Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde amounted to a roar that totally undermined the semantic infrastructure. The other composer to receive significant attention was Maurice Ravel, whose “Pavane pour une infante défunte” (pavane for a dead princess) and “La valse” were performed in Herbst Theatre by Louis Lortie exactly two weeks earlier. The conclusion of the former was delivered with a heavy hand, while the account of the latter left me wondering if that would have been how Franz Liszt would have played it.

The program began with early keyboard compositions by François Couperin and Jean-Philippe Rameau. The latter was the Gavotte movement from the RCT 5 suite in A minor. In that movement the dance theme is followed by six variations. Bartlett delivered an account that sounded as if it has been written for a modern piano. Clearly, the composer did not have this in mind; but the interpretation was both solid and convincing. This was preceded by one of the best-known short pieces by Couperin, “Les Baricades mystérieuses;” but Bartlett leaned so heavily on the damper pedal that it was almost impossible to sort the theme out from the arpeggiated accompaniment.

Both encores were selections from George Gershwin’s Song Book, “The Man I Love” and “I Got Rhythm.” I used to enjoy listening to Earl Wild play this music in recital, and his approach to Gershwin was always engaging. Bartlett’s account left me wondering if he even knew there were words behind those songs, let alone the denotations and connotations of those words!

I fear that the Shenson “spotlight” deserves better!

Roar Shack to Present Honey Mahogany

Honey Mahogany (from the Eventbrite Web page for this production)

The next performance be presented at The Roar Shack by The Living Earth Show duo of guitarist Travis Andrews and drummer Andy Meyerson with be a night of music created by Honey Mahogany and “her chosen family of collaborators.” The title of the program is Black Thursday; and according to the Eventbrite Web page, Mahogany is “a multi-hyphenate San Francisco legend who has worked in drag, music, and political organizing as a force for queer and trans voices in the Bay Area and beyond.” Mahogany will be joined by local drag and music legends Dulce De Leche, Militia Towers, and Lambert Moss. Living Earth will provide the music, performing with Van Jackson-Weaver on bass.

Admission to this event will be by donation. The Eventbrite Web page allows for “Pay What You Can” purchase with a recommended rate between $1 and $100. The venue is located in SoMa at 34 Seventh Street. The entry is through a secret side door on Odd Fellows Way, which is called Stevenson Street on the other side of Seventh. Doors will open at 6:45 p.m. on Thursday, April 17. The performance will begin at 7:30 p.m. and last for one hour, followed by a one-hour “Postshow hang.”

Beginning a Beethoven Journey with Guarneri

When I began my “chronological journey” of the Sony Masterworks box set, Guarneri Quartet: The Complete Recordings 1965–2005, my first two articles dealt with First Viennese School composers in chronological order: Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. However, where Ludwig van Beethoven is concerned, most listeners are aware that there are significant stylistic differences across the “early,” “middle,” and “late” quartets. As a result, I would like to deal with these as separate categories, giving each its own article.

Original album cover for the Beethoven “middle” quartets (from the Amazon.com Web page for that album)

In the Sony release, the “first to appear” is the three-CD album entitled The Five Middle Quartets; and that is where I would like to begin. Many readers probably know that the first three of the quartets were collected as Beethoven’s Opus 59. They are known as the “Razumovsky” quartets, because they were commissioned by Count Andreas Razumovsky, who, at that time, was the Russian ambassador to Vienna. The Wikipedia page for this set provides a useful account of how Beethoven endowed each of the quartets with a reference to Russian music. The other two quartets are Opus 74 in E-flat major, known as the “Harp” quartet for its pizzicato passages, and Opus 95, called “Serioso” for its F minor key.

It is highly likely that, over the course of my regular trips to Grand Central Station, I encountered Guarneri performances of all five of these quartets in recital. (Since I was not documenting these experiences at that time, I cannot be certain.) However, the recordings were made between 1966 and 1968, when my primary focus was on undergraduate and graduate studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Thus, any of the performances I attended took place long after these works were recorded.

These days, I do my best to keep up with opportunities to listen to these quartets. Some readers may recall that my most recent encounter was almost exactly a month ago, when the Calidore Quartet played Opus 74 in Herbst Theatre during their third visit to San Francisco Performances. They may also recall that, when I wrote about the Guarneri recordings of quartets by Joseph Haydn, I closed by invoking Leonard Slatkin’s precept: “You can never conduct enough Haydn or Schubert.” That may be so; but, where Beethoven is concerned, I cannot get enough of opportunities to listen to his string quartets. The “late” quartets (to be discussed on this site in the, hopefully, near future) may be the most mind-bending; but I do my best to attend any performance of a “middle” quartet taking place here in San Francisco. In the absence of such opportunities, I am glad that I now have these Guarneri accounts as an alternative!

SFP to Present Isidore String Quartet

Isidore String Quartet performers Devin Moore, Phoenix Avalon, Adrian Steele, and Joshua McClendon (from the SFP Web page for purchasing tickets)

For those that do not yet know, all four of the programs in this season’s San Francisco Performances (SFP) Chamber Series are string quartet recitals. The last of those four will be presented one week from tomorrow, and the performers will be the members of the Isidore String Quartet. The name probably acknowledges a connection to violinist Isidore Cohen, who was second violinist in the Juilliard String Quartet back when I heard my first performance of the group. The performers of this quartet are violinists Adrian Steele and Phoenix Avalon, Devin Moore on viola, and cellist Joshua McClendon.

It would be fair to say that both the opening and closing selections on the program reflect on the Juilliard repertoire. Things will begin with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 465 string quartet in C major, known as the “Dissonance” for the ambiguous introduction to the first movement. The concluding selection will be Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 127 in E-flat major, the first of his “late” quartets. Between these selections will be a work composed for the ensemble by pianist Billy Childs. This will be his third string quartet, given the title “Unrequited.”

The program will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 16. Ticket prices are $70 (premium Orchestra and front and center Dress Circle), $60 (remainder of Orchestra, all Side Boxes, and center rear Dress Circle), and $50 (remaining Dress Circle and Balcony). As always, they may be purchased through an SFP secure Web page. The venue will be Herbst Theatre, whose entrance is the main entrance to the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue, located on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. The venue is excellent for public transportation, since that corner has Muni bus stops for both north-south and east-west travel.

New Album from Jordan Glenn

Percussionist Jordan Glenn performing (photograph by Eric Vogler)

Percussionist Jordan Glenn is unlikely to be a stranger to those that follow this site regularly, particularly those keeping track of “Bleeding Edge” events. At the end of last week, he was the percussionist for a trio performance at the Center for New Music led by guitarist Elliot Sharp. (The third member of the trio was Brett Carson on piano.) Last month he had a set in the monthly Jazz at the Make-Out Room concert, joined by Matt Robidoux on synthesizer, and Sudhu Tewari playing his home-made instruments.

This past Friday his BEAK ensemble released a new album entitled The Party, which is available through a Bandcamp Web page. Glenn composed the entire album and conducted its performance, adding his own contributions on spring box. The other performers are listed on the Bandcamp page as follows:

• Mark Pascucci-Clifford - vibraphone, bundtmonica, gongs, tongue tube
• David James - electric guitar, modified electric guitar
• Karl Evangelista - electric guitar, modified electric guitar
• Lisa Mezzacappa - acoustic bass, foot bass
• Jon Arkin - drums, tongue tube, electronics
• Robert Lopez - percussion, bundtmonica, tongue tube
• Sudhu Tewari - no string guitars, YEMRS (Yasmin Electro Magnetic Rhythm Sequencer), bundtmonica

The tongue tube, bundtmonica, foot bass, and no string guitars are all Tewari’s inventions.

The performances involved both conducted improvisation and compositions. As an “uninformed listener,” I can confess that I have no idea which of the seven tracks fall into which category! Nevertheless, the overall rhetoric is an engaging one. Much of the rhythm verges on mind-bending, and the diversity of sonorities is delightful. In that context, I was amused to see that, in the advance material, the adjectives “psychedelic” and “whimsical” were situated side-by-side!

Having listened to this album several times in preparing to write this article, I suspect that I shall return for further visits in the future!

The Bleeding Edge: 4/8/2025

This week on the Bleeding Edge will be even quieter than last week. Even the previously-reported events are fewer than those in the past. In fact, there are only two of them, both of which will be taking place on Saturday, April 12:

1. The next G|O|D|W|A|F|F|L|E|N|O|I|S|E|P|A|N|C|A|K|E|S event will be hosted by the Center for New Music beginning at noon.
2. The San Francisco Contemporary Music Players will present their Northern Lights program in the Dianne and Tad Taube Atrium Theater beginning at 7:30 p.m.

The remaining three events of the week will take place on Thursday and Friday as follows:

Poster design for this week’s performance at the Peacock Lounge (from the BayImproviser event page)

Thursday, April 10, Peacock Lounge: 8 p.m: Following his return from Japan, Mickey Tachibana will perform as Com£♡ (compound love). He will create an immersive experiences by integrating modular synthesis, ethnic instruments, and field recordings. It is hard to say what to expect from Thomas Carnacki, given the diversity of content found on his Bandcamp Web page; but the performance he is preparing apparently involves ghosts. The set taken by Thomas Dimuzio will probably be more straightforward, presenting his Innovative techniques of sound synthesis, signal processing, algorithmic mixing, and custom crossfade looping. The remaining set will be taken by W.O.E., the duo of JaMile Jackson and Brian Tester, both of whom have cultivated their improvisational skills through their long histories in the Bay Area's electronic and underground rock scenes.

Friday, April 11, Medicine for Nightmares, 7 p.m.: This week’s Other Dimensions in Sound program will performed by vocalist Fumi Davis and poet Fred Moten.  As always, the venue is located in the Mission at 3036 24th Street, between Treat Avenue and Harrison Street. There is no charge for admission, presumably to encourage visitors to consider buying a book.

Friday, April 11, 8:30 p.m., Bird & Beckett Books and Records: Saxophonist Aaron Bennett will lead his jazz trio, performing with Dan Seamans on bass and drummer Tim Bulkley. The venue is located at 653 Chenery Street, a short walk from the Glen Park station that serves both BART and Muni. The price of admission has not yet been announced, but it is usually a cover charge of $25. Given the limited space of the venue, reservations are necessary and can be made by calling 415-586-3733. The phone will be answered during regular store hours, which are between noon and 6 p.m. on Tuesday through Sunday.

Omni Releases New Video of Julia Trintschuk

Julia Trintschuk singing while accompanying herself on her guitar (screen shot from the video being discussed)

Early this afternoon I learned of the latest video to be uploaded to YouTube by the Omni Foundation for the Performing Arts. The title of the video is Julia Trintschuk | Una Palabra. “Una Palabra” is the title of a song by Carlos Varela, which dwells on love, loss, and the power of silence. The lyrics are included on the YouTube Web page with each of the lines in Spanish coupled with an English translation. The guitar accompaniment was arranged by Joaquin Clerch. The video was captured during a performance presented by Omni this past February 18th. The experience is “short and sweet;” but there is no shortage of nuance packed into the expressiveness of the performance. The duration may be only four minutes, but I found it time well spent!

SFB to Revive Two Ballets from Last Season

Misa Kuranaga and Joseph Walsh performing the title roles of Frederick Ashton’s “Marguerite and Armand” (© Reneff-Olson Productions)

This month San Francisco Ballet (SFB) will alternate its performances of the Hans van Manen program with a double bill program of two works from last season. The first of these is Annabelle Lopez Ochoa’s ballet “Broken Wings,” a study in the life of Frida Kahlo, whose performance requires two corps de ballet, one of skeletons and the other of “Male Fridas.” The other is Frederic Ashton’s “Marguerite and Armand,” a distillation of La Traviata into a single act of choreography set to the music of Franz Liszt.

This program will alternate with the van Manen program on the following dates and times:

• Tuesday, April 8, 7:30 p.m.
• Thursday, April 10, 7:30 p.m.
• Saturday, April 12, 2 p.m.
• Saturday, April 12, 8 p.m.
• Sunday, April 13, 2 p.m.
• Wednesday, April 16, 7:30 p.m.
• Friday, April 18, 8 p.m.

All performances will take place in the War Memorial Opera House, which is on the northwest corner of Van Ness Avenue and Grove Street (across Grove from Davies Symphony Hall). A single Web page has been created for purchasing tickets for all of the above dates and times. Tickets may also be purchased at the Box Office in the outer lobby of the Opera House or by calling 415-865-2000. The Box Office is open for ticket sales Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Chamber Music San Francisco Hosts Bronfman

Unless I am mistaken, my first encounter with pianist Yefim Bronfman took place during the first half of the Eighties. That was when I was working in Ridgefield, Connecticut, and taking every opportunity to get to Grand Central Station, which provided easy walks to both Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. This provided a more-than-generous share of opportunities to listen to piano recitals. I cannot remember what Bronfman played the first time I saw him; but I was on the edge of my seat trying to follow how he could maintain so much precision over such a broad range of dynamics.

Yesterday afternoon Bronfman appeared in Herbst Theatre for the latest Chamber Music San Francisco recital. The second half of his program presented seldom-heard music, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s four-movement Opus 37, given the title “Grand Piano Sonata.” The first half was probably familiar to most of the audience.

Bronfman began with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 332 (twelfth) piano sonata, composed in the key of F major. This was followed by Robert Schumann’s Opus 18 in C major, given the title “Arabeske.” The first half then concluded with the second set of Images (three pieces), composed by Claude Debussy.

Each of these three pieces had its own distinctive approach to rhetoric. Bronfman consistently mined the expressiveness of each of them in his performances. Most importantly, however, he never “overplayed his hand,” so to speak, knowing when to keep close hold on the reins and when to let them loose. I was particularly taken with his approach to Debussy, whose rhetoric often comes across as one passing gesture after another. Bronfman knew exactly how to convey the coherence among all those gestures.

1888 cabinet card portrait of Tchaikovsky attributed to Émile Reutlinger (from Wikimedia Commons, public domain)

The Tchaikovsky sonata was another matter. One can definitely appreciate why it receives so little attention! This was, without a doubt, one of those pieces that lives up to too-many-notes criticism! There were times when I felt that Bronfman may have been playing too fast just to show off his dexterity, but I suspect that would be an unfair assessment. More likely, he decided that a piece performed so seldom deserved a bit of attention. At least I can say that I now know that sonata exists and that I have listened to it!

Bronfman took two encores without announcing either. The first sounded like one of Tchaikovsky’s shorter solo piano pieces, and I am not particularly familiar with that genre. The second was more familiar: the fifth, in the key of G minor, of the ten preludes in Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Opus 23 collection. This would have been an “old friend” for many in the audience; and it provided the opportunity for Bronfman to go out on just the right note (so to speak).

Undermined by Digital Technology!

One Found Sound was kind enough to call me out on a major misunderstanding. This morning I took issue with the ensemble for the absence of program notes, particularly for the two new works in the first half of the program. Not long after I filed my article, I received word from One Found Sound providing a URL for the digital program: https://www.onefoundsound.org/sonicblooms.

Front face of the latest (as of this writing) Apple iPhone (from the iPhone Wikipedia page)

At last night’s concert, this was available to anyone with a cell phone that could capture a QR code on the table where tickets were being sold. I used that code and all four of the works on the program fit on my phone’s screen. Unfortunately, a cell phone screen is not like a window in a computer screen display. When I visited the URL on my computer, I saw a scroll bar, which I could not see on my phone display.

Sure enough, there was a generous amount of content that I could see on my computer that I did not know existed on my phone! I missed the acknowledgement “that the land on which we are gathered for this performance, and on which we have gathered for our rehearsals, is located on the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramaytush Ohlone peoples.” That text was provided in Spanish following the English version. Continuing the scroll led to a complete account of all the contributing performers, sorted by their respective instruments. Most of what followed was then devoted to the sort of program notes that tend to guide how I write about the performances I attend (again in both English and Spanish).

This made for a generous amount of background content. Most important were the one-paragraph summaries provided by each of the two composers of the new works. My guess is that, had I read those paragraphs, I would have had more to say about those recent compositions; but, in the absence of that content, there was little I could offer beyond what I wrote yesterday!

To be fair, the full background for each of those composers occupied far more space than was occupied by the list of program selections. I doubt that I would have given this much content the attention it deserves had I been limited to the window on my iPhone. On the other hand, preparing a physical document, such as the one given to me at this afternoon’s recital in Herbst Theatre, is a major undertaking for both time and finances. I can appreciate the “digital advantages” of a cell phone, but last night taught me a harsh lesson about its limitations!

Jonathan Salzedo Returning to Noontime Concerts

Karen Bentley Pollick and Jonathan Salzedo (from the Noontime Concerts Web page for their coming recital)

I came to know the work of harpsichordist Jonathan Salzedo through his performances as a member of the Albany Consort. However, it seems that I have not accounted for one of their events since their visit to Old St. Mary’s Cathedral to give a Noontime Concerts™ recital in February of 2023. Therefore, I am happy to report that Salzedo will present his next Noontime Concerts™ program one week from this coming Tuesday. This will be a duo recital with violinist Karen Bentley Pollick, which will interleave music from the eighteenth century with three contemporary offerings by two composers.

The program will begin with Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 1018 sonata in F minor for violin and harpsichord. The other eighteenth-century selection will be a solo harpsichord performance of a keyboard setting of music for Psalm 140 by Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck. This will be coupled with a contemporary composition for solo violin by Charles Mason entitled “Bach Scratch.” Mason will also conclude the program with his duo “Go Dog Go.” The other living composer will be Ludmila Yurina, whose solo violin composition “Duma” will be performed after the Bach sonata.

Like all events in the Noontime Concerts series, the performance will take place in the sanctuary of Old Saint Mary’s beginning at 12:30 p.m. on a Tuesday, February 15. The cathedral is located at 660 California Street, on the northeast corner of Grant Street. There is no charge for admission, but this concert series relies heavily on donations to continue offering its weekly programs.

One Found Sound Presents Spring Program

OFS musicians in performance (from the banner on the Web page for last night’s program)

Last night One Found Sound (OFS), the local orchestra that performs without a conductor, welcomed spring with a program entitled Sonic Blooms. The “flowers that bloomed,” so to speak, were two new compositions created for this year’s Emerging Composer Award competition. The winer of that competition was Ty Bloomfield with a composition entitled “FLUX // DRIVE,” given its world premiere performance. This was preceded by the West Coast premiere of the runner-up composition, “Shubho Lhaw Qolo,” by Sami Seif. This featured a solo viola performance by Sam Nelson. The second half of the program paired the Adagietto movement from Gustav Mahler’s fifth symphony with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 550 (40th) symphony in G minor.

The highest form of praise for a new work is a desire to hear it again. This was the case for both of the pieces in the first half. Not only does OFS perform without a conductor, but also they do not provide program notes. Each work receives an oral introduction; but, where the new pieces are concerned, that provided little material for either anticipation or reflection. As a result, there is little I can report about how either of these composers cultivated their respective rhetorical stances, let alone how those stances were established through approaches to instrumentation. Those that attend concerts frequently know that the capacity for listening is usually cultivated through program notes! Nevertheless, I would welcome the opportunity to encounter both of those new works in subsequent performances.

Fortunately, program notes were not necessary for the second half of the program. Both selections are frequently encountered, meaning that, probably for the most part, listeners knew what to expect. The Mahler movement was given a thoroughly engaging account with a better view of the contributing harp performance than one tends to encounter at Davies Symphony Hall. Sadly, there was no account on the OFS Web site of who that harpist was. The Mozart selection could not have been more familiar to most of the audience, but there was a freshness to the performance that sustained attention to all of those notes many listeners already know by heart.

Guarneri Quartet: the Mozart Recordings

Having begun my “journey” of the Sony Masterworks box set, Guarneri Quartet: The Complete Recordings 1965–2005, with a modest account of works by Joseph Haydn, I can now move on to the more generous attention paid to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This consists of ten string quartets, six viola quintets, and two piano quartets. The pianist is Artur Rubinstein, and three different violists contribute to the quintets. They are (in “order of appearance”) Ida Kavafian, Steven Tenenbom, and Kim Kashkashian, each accounting for two of the quintets.

Album cover showing the members of the Guarneri Quartet on the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (from the Amazon.com Web page for this album)

I must confess that I have a particular soft spot for the quintets. One of my colleagues at the campus radio station at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology liked to say that a viola is what a violin wants to be when it grows up. On a less facetious note, Mozart biographies inform us that he sent much of his time in Vienna playing string quartets with his colleagues (one of whom as Joseph Haydn); and his preferred instrument as the viola. All six of the quintets were recorded during performances at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The other recorded “collection” consists of another set of six, this time the quartets that Mozart dedicated to Joseph Haydn. These are as follows:

• K. 387 in G major
• K. 421 in D minor
• K. 428 in E-flat major
• K. 458 in B-flat major
• K. 464 in A major
• K. 465 in C major

Two other albums account for the composer’s last four quartets:

• K. 499 in D major
• K. 575 in D major
• K. 589 in B-flat major
• K. 590 in F major

That leaves only one other album in the collection. This is the Rubinstein performance of the two Mozart piano quartets, K. 478 in G minor and K. 493 in E-flat major. The single violinist for these performances in John Dalley.

It is important to note that this ensemble was formed prior to the rise of interest in historically informed performances. In many respects twentieth-century style reflected back on nineteenth-century performance practices and instruments. However, those that are not “Mozart purists” will find much to savor in the approaches that Guarneri took to that composer’s rhetorical turns. There is no questioning that these recordings now serve as “time machines.” Nevertheless, since they date from a period when I was just beginning to get my head around chamber music, I have no problems with traveling in that time machine!

More Mozart Coming from Pocket Opera

A little over a month ago, Pocket Opera enjoyed a sold-out performance of its first production of the 2025 season, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro. Next week the company will return to the Gunn Theatre on the lower level of the Legion of Honor Museum for the second offering. This will present more Mozart with an interesting twist or two. The full title of the program is A Pocket Magic Flute & Bastien and Bastienne.

Kenneth Kellogg and Shawnette Sulker as the title characters of “Bastien und Bastienne” (courtesy of Pocket Opera)

The Magic Flute (K. 620) was created as a two-act Singspiel (singing with spoken dialogue) involving a cast of fantastical characters, only a few of whom are mere mortals. This usually involves a generous amount of complex stage effects, which, as might be expected, is “beyond the pay grade” of Pocket Opera. As a result, the “pocket” version will be presented as an animated film that was four years in the making. The screening will be preceded by a brief “making-of” documentary. The intermission will be followed by one of Mozart’s earliest operas (composed when he was twelve years old), the K. 50 one-act “Bastien und Bastienne,” conceived as a parody of the popular “pastoral” genre. (Bastienne is a shepherdess.)

As usual, the performance will take place at the Legion of Honor. It will begin at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 13. As many readers probably know by now, the Legion of Honor is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. It is located at 100 34th Avenue, which is basically right in the center of Lincoln Park. General admission will be $84. Those age 30 and under may purchase tickets for $30. A Web page has been created for online purchases.

Technology Takes it on the Chin at SFCM

An example of Feuillet’s dance notation (from a Wikimedia Commons Web page, public domain)

Last night on the ground floor of the Bowes Center, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) presented a survey of works by eight students in the Technology and Applied Composition department. The student performers were Lylia Guion on violin, cellist Megan Chartier, and Taylor Chan on piano. For the world premiere of one selection, Han Lash’s “Orchesography,” they were joined by Nanette McGuinness, Artistic Executive Director of Ensemble for These Times, who served as narrator. I could not identify the source of the text, but I am pretty certain that it had nothing to do with either Thoinot Arbeau or Raoul Auger Feuillet (the two pioneers of dance notation). Lash was supposed to perform with this ensemble as dancer but was unable to attend.

Taken as a whole, the six works on the program constituted a distressingly incoherent jumble of well-intentioned chamber music performances with video projections running the gamut from arbitrary to tedious. In that context the high point of the evening came with Chartier giving a solo performance of “ko’u inoa” by Leilehua Lanzilotti, which probably came closest to avoiding to mistake of going on for too long. This was a relief in the wake of the the world premieres that preceded it, which, along with “Orchesography,” included “Okean” by Tamara McLeod, Niloufar Nourbakhsh’s “Cavities,” and “Who Are You Now?” by Clark Evans.

Back in my student days, there was a sharp distinction between “Mathematics” and “Applied Mathematics.” The latter was for engineering. The former was often called “Pure Mathematics;” and those who studied it (myself included) took pride in working with “the real thing.” That sense of “the real thing” was painfully absent in last night’s performance, as if it had been cast into the shadows by the “Technology and Applied.” I prefer music that aspires to “purity,” whether in composition or in performance!

SFB to Honor Hans van Manen with Four Ballets

I first became aware of choreographer Hans van Manen during my graduate student days. Choreographer James Waring would make weekly visits to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); and I was a regular attendee. Waring died not long after I left MIT with my doctoral degree; but, at the age of 92, van Manen is still alive and kicking (if not creating new dances). The next production for the 2025 Repertory season of the San Francisco Ballet (SFB) will honor his legacy with a program of four works that he created between 1971 and 2012. Sadly, I do not think I have seen any of them.

Dores André performing van Manen’s “5 Tango’s” (courtesy of SFB)

The final work on the program will be the one San Francisco premiere. “5 Tango’s” (yes, the apostrophe is on the Wikipedia page, even if I have no reason why) was created in 1977. As many might guess, each of the movements is a setting of a composition by Astor Piazzolla. The most ambitious undertaking will probably be the opening selection, “Grosse Fuge,” a setting of Ludwig van Beethoven’s single-movement composition of the same title, his Opus 133 scored for string quartet. The other two selections involve music by Johann Sebastian Bach, whose specifics have not been announced. Since the casting information identifies three members of the corps de ballet for “Solo,” I assume that the music will be from the composer’s set of sonatas and partitas for solo violin. The remaining work on the program will be “Variations for Two Couples.” The music is a compilation of works by four composers. The contribution by Stevan Kovacs Tickmayer takes Bach as a point of departure. The other three composers are Benjamin Britten, Einojuhani Rautavaara, and Piazzolla.

The full list of performances dates and times is as follows:

• Saturday, April 5, 8 p.m.
• Sunday, April 6, 2 p.m.
• Wednesday, April 9, 7:30 p.m.
• Friday, April 11, 8 p.m.
• Tuesday, April 15, 7:30 p.m.
• Thursday, April 16, 7:30 p.m.
• Saturday, April 19, 2 p.m.

All performances will take place in the War Memorial Opera House, which is on the northwest corner of Van Ness Avenue and Grove Street (across Grove from Davies Symphony Hall). A single Web page has been created for purchasing tickets for all of the above dates and times. Tickets may also be purchased at the Box Office in the outer lobby of the Opera House or by calling 415-865-2000. The Box Office is open for ticket sales Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Randall Goosby’s Debut with SFP

Violinist Randall Goosby is no stranger to San Francisco. He performed in Davies Symphony Hall in April of 2022 in the second of the four Spotlight Series recitals that San Francisco Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen launched to feature entirely debut concerts. Goosby’s accompanist was pianist Zhu Wang. Last night he made his first appearance in Herbst Theatre, this time under the auspices of San Francisco Performances; and he was again accompanied by Wang.

The first half of the program presented two sonatas for two decidedly different eras in French history. It began with the last in a set of three violin sonatas by the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, Joseph Bologne. His Wikipedia page cites him as “the first classical composer of African descent to attain widespread acclaim in European music;” and my encounters with his music have been consistently engaging. Goosby’s selection was in the key of G minor with only two movements, the usual opening Allegro followed by a Rondo gracioso. Most interesting was the composer’s attentiveness to balancing the thematic material between both players, making this an ideal selection to introduce both Goosby and Wang to the audience.

This was followed by the more familiar Opus 13 of Gabriel Fauré, his first violin sonata composed in the key of A major. The Fauré catalog plays a major role in my collection of recordings. Nevertheless, I think this was my first encounter with this sonata in performance; and I could not have been more delighted with the listening experience.

The second half of the program bridged the two ends of the nineteenth century. It began in the final decade with Ernest Chausson’s Opus 25, given simply the title “Poème.” This was originally composed for full orchestra with violin solo and subsequently given the duo arrangement performed last night.

The program concluded with music originally composed for violin and piano, Franz Schubert’s D. 895 in B minor, given the title “Rondeau brillant.” Schubert composed only six duos for violin and piano; and this was the only one to be published (by Artaria) in his lifetime. The overall rhetoric can best be described as “frantically witty,” almost as if it is a reflection of maintaining a sense of humor in a state of desperation. Both Goosby and Wang were clearly intensely focused on performance, allowing the dispositions to arise on their own accord.

Randall Goosby on the cover of the Deluxe Edition of his Roots album (from its Amazon.com Web page)

Goosby turned to Florence Price for his encore. His selection was “Elfentanz,” one of the tracks on the “Deluxe Edition” of his Roots album. This made for a witty conclusion to smooth things off after Schubert. Goosby is definitely a recitalist with an imaginative and engaging approach to creating programs!

SFP Announces 2025–2026 Season

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain (photograph by Stefan Mager, courtesy of SFP)

This is the time of year when San Francisco Performances (SFP) announces its new season; and, sure enough, that announcement arrived in my electronic mail yesterday. This will be the 46th season; and, hopefully as in the past, this site will, prior to the beginning of the season, give a series-by-series account of the programs that have been planned. This year’s Gala will be on October 10 and will be held in conjunction with the first piano recital of the season, which will be performed by pianists Jeffrey and Gabriel Kahane. The season will again conclude at the beginning of May with the return of The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain.

Once again, Historian-in-Residence Robert Greenberg will curate a Saturday morning series, beginning at 10 a.m. Those familiar with SFP probably know that, in the past, music was provided by the members of the Alexander String Quartet; but, now that they have disbanded, they will be replaced by the Esmé Quartet. This year the series will focus on Franz Schubert; and, in the final program, the quartet members will be joined by cellist Paul Wiancko for the D. 956 string quintet in C major.

The PIVOT Festival will again return at the end of January with performances on January  30 and 31 and February 1. The curator will be Andy Meyerson, the percussionist of The Living Earth Show. He will perform with his The Living Earth Show duo partner, guitarist Travis Andrews. The final program will present a contemporary take on classical ballet with San Francisco Ballet choreographer and dancer Myles Thatcher. As usual, the other series will be familiar to SFP audiences:

• Art of Song
• Piano
• Contemporary Chamber (featuring the Attacca Quartet)
• The Robert and Ruth Dell Guitar Series
• Chamber Series
• Here Now and Then
• The Shenson Great Artists and Ensembles Series

As in the past, the Guitar Series will be presented in association with the OMNI Foundation for the Performing Arts.

Subscriptions will go on sale on April 9. Presumably, the usual booklet that summarizes all of the coming programs, supplemented with color photographs, will be sent in the mail to current subscribers. The benefits of subscribing include savings on single ticket prices, priority seating, free ticket exchange privileges, and invitations to the annual Gift Concert. This season that event will be a recital by the Arod Quartet, which has not yet announced program details. Subscribers may select individual series or create their own packages. They may be ordered by calling the Ticket Office at 415-677-0325, and presumably a Web page for online orders will be made available on April 9. Single tickets will go on sale on August 27.

Ana Vidović Coming to Herbst Next Week

Ana Vidović with her guitar (courtesy of the  Omni Foundation)

Some readers may recall that Croatian guitarist Ana Vidović made her last visit to San Francisco a little less than a year ago as a recitalist for the Omni Foundation for the Performing Arts. At the end of next week, she will return to give her next Omni recital. However, while last year’s performance took place in St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, this year she will visit Herbst Theatre.

This time there will be more emphasis on Hispanic composers. The second half of the program will feature two works by the Spanish composer Federico Moreno Torroba, his 1924 Sonatina and the three-movement Suite castellana, composed in 1926. These two selections will be separated by Joaquín Turina Opus 61, a three-movement sonata. That emphasis on the sonata will be reinforced by arrangements of four of the single-movement keyboard sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti: K. 213 in D minor, K. 1 in D minor, K. 27 in B minor, and K. 239 in F minor.

The first half of the program will be devoted almost entirely to Johann Sebastian Bach. Vidović will begin with the BWV 1006 E major partita for solo violin. The transcription was prepared by fellow Croatian Valter Dešpalj (who happens to be a cellist). This will be followed by the better-known arrangement by Andres Segovia of the Chaconne movement that concludes Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 1004 solo violin partita in D minor. The first half will then conclude with the “Sonatina Meridional” by Mexican composer Manuel Ponce.

This performance will begin, as usual, at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 12. Also as usual, the venue is located at 401 Van Ness Avenue, on the southwest corner of McAllister Street and directly across Van Ness from City Hall. City Box Office has created a Web page for online ticket purchases. Tickets for the Boxes and Orchestra range between $60 and $70. The remaining tickets are in the Dress Circle and the Balcony, with prices between $50 and $70.

Rust and Edelmann to Return to Bay Area

I first became aware of the husband and wife duo of cellist Rebecca Rust and Friedrich Edelmann on bassoon back when I was seeking out interesting venues to write about for Examiner.com in my capacity as San Francisco Classical Music Examiner. Every Tuesday morning I would set off on foot to get to Chinatown in time for lunch, after which I would head over the Old Saint Mary’s Cathedral on the northeast corner of Grant Avenue and California Street. That was the venue for Noontime Concerts, which would begin at 12:30 PM on Tuesdays. On that particular afternoon, in September of 2012, Rust and Edelmann concluded their recital with Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 69 duo sonata; and their account was solid enough to pique my interest.

Friedrich Edelmann and Rebecca Rust (from the Examiner.com article being discussed)

That interest sustained after the passing of Examiner.com; but, according to my records, I have not had an opportunity to write about this duo since October of 2017. This was another “Musical Lunch Break” concert at Old Saint Mary’s, this time featuring a suite in G minor for cello and bassoon by Jean-Baptiste Loeillet. Once again, an “extended interval” has passed; but Rust and Edelmann will be back in San Francisco next week. They have prepared a program that they will perform three times in this city, one of which will involve returning to Noontime Concerts. However, this will be the last of their appearances, which I shall now address in chronological order.

Their tour will begin at the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption (which is about as imposing as Old Saint Mary’s is modest). Once again, Beethoven will conclude the performance, this time with the first of the two Opus 5 duo sonatas, composed in the key of F major. This will be preceded by Johannes Brahms’ Opus 78, known as the “Rain Sonata” because it appropriated a theme from “Regenlied” (rain song), the third of the Opus 59 set of eight. This was arranged for cello and piano by Paul Klengel. Pianist Dmitriy Cogan will accompany Rust for both of these selections. Edelmann will complete the trio only at the beginning of the program for a performance of Mikhail Glinka’s IMG 41 “Trio Pathétique” in D minor, originally scored for clarinet, bassoon, and piano.

Dates, times, and venues for the three performances are as follows:

1. April 6, 4 p.m., Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption, 1111 Gough Street, between Geary Boulevard and Ellis Street
2. April 7, 8 p.m., San Francisco Towers, 1661 Pine Street, between Franklin Street and Van Ness Avenue
3. April 8, 12:30 p.m., Old Saint Mary’s, 660 California Street