Choices for December 6, 2025

It may seem a bit early; but, prior to the usual seasonal rush, serious listeners will have to make a choice for the first Saturday in December. There are currently two options, which will overlap. One will be the latest installment in pianist Ian Scarfe’s Suspended Harmony programs and the other will be a birthday celebration by the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony (BARS). Specifics are as follows:

7 p.m., Monument SF: Once again, Scarfe and cellist Kendra Grittani will share the program with circus performers. Contributions from the latter will amount to (in the words of the announcement on the Groupmuse Web page) “a variety of performers and dancers on Pole, Aerial Silks, Lyra, Mime and Clowning, and Tap Dance!” The music to be performed will include Sergei Prokofiev’s Opus 119 cello sonata and a “Best of Beethoven” selection. The Monument event space is located in SoMa at 140 9th Street. As in the past, ticketing is being managed by the aforementioned Groupmuse Web page.

Photograph of the first act of the original Imperial Ballet production of The Nutcracker, made around December of 1892 (scanned from the 1997 book The Life and Ballets of Lev Ivanov, public domain in the United States, from Wikimedia Commons)

7:30 p.m., San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM): The BARS celebration will be that of composer David Conte’s 70th birthday. He will be honored with the first suite he extracted from his 1992 tone poem “The Masque of the Red Death.” Cellist Hans Brightbill will be soloist in a performance of Ernest Bloch’s “Schelomo,” given the subtitle “Rhapsodie Hébraïque for Violoncello and Orchestra.” The entire program will be framed by the music of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, beginning with “Romeo and Juliet,” described as a “Fantasy Overture.” The program will conclude with excepts from first act of the ballet The Nutcracker. (Most of the movements of the familiar suite extracted from the ballet score come from the second act.) Cyrus Ginwala will be guest conductor.

The venue will be the SFCM Concert Hall at 50 Oak Street, a short walk from the Van Ness Muni station. tix has created a Web page for processing ticket sales.Ticket prices range between $43.50 and $12. The Web page includes a chart showing which seats are available at what prices.