November 7 will be a Full Saturday

The first Saturday of next month will be shared by the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) and San Francisco Performances (SFP). The good news, however, is that the performances will not overlap. The first will take place in the afternoon and the second in the evening. Specifics are as follows:

Saturday, November 7, 3 p.m., Davies Symphony Hall: As in the past, the month will begin with the annual Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebration. This will open with an afternoon of festivities in the lobby followed by a concert. The SFS musicians will be joined by two musicians playing salterio, the Spanish version of a dulcimer. David Hernández will play the soprano instrument, joined by Claudio Israel Vázquez on tenor. There will also be a solo violin performance by Francisco Fullana. As in the past, SFS will share the stage with the Casa Círculo Cultural ensemble. The program will include two compositions by Carlos Chávez, beginning with 1947 toccata for orchestra, originally composed as incidental music for a staged version of Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote. The other selection will be the “Zarabanda” movement from the score for the ballet “La hija de Cólquide” (the daughter of Colchis). As always seems to be the case, the program will include a performance of José Pablo Moncayo’s “Huapango.”

Photograph of Agustín Barrios taken late in his life in the early 1940’s (from Wikimedia Commons, public domain)

Saturday, November 7, 7:30 p.m., St. Mark’s Lutheran Church: Following the beginning of the SFP Guitar Series with the debut of guitarist Berta Rojas, the second Guitar Series program will be a solo recital by Djiboutian-French artist Raphaël Feuillâtre. His program will include his own arrangements of piano music composed by Isaac Albéniz, as well as an arrangement of Domenico Scarlatti’s K. 492 sonata in D major by Gérard Abiton, and Sergio Assad’s arrangement of Astor Piazzolla’s “Invierno Porteño," the “winter” movement of Estaciones Porteñas (known in English as “The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires”). Assad will also contribute to the program with music composed for guitar, “Caterete,” the fourth movement in his Suite brasileira. Other composers of guitar music will include Francisco Tárrega, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, and Agustín Barrios.