Tag Archives: Davies Symphony Hall

Gemma New Conducts SF Symphony Brilliantly

Conductor Gemma New brought her musical brilliance and personable presence to Davies Symphony Hall, May 10 & 12. On May 11th, she led the SFS in the same program at UC, Davis. It was a program of music with distant origins. Overture, was created in Poland by Polish composer Grazyna Bacewicz while Poland was occupied by Germany, 1943. Englishman Edward Elgar wrote his beautiful, tragic ‘Cello Concerto in E minor, Opus 85, in 1919. Where did that music come from? Elgar had suspended his composing from the beginning of World War I. The horrors of the war kept his writing to brief, minor pieces. This music came from England but also from the fields and trenches of Belgium. Felix Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Opus 56, Scottish, 1842. While Mendelssohn’s music was inspired by his visit to Scotland, its history, impressions of its dramatic seascape, and dances, Mendelssohn’s music was about music. It is a great symphony.

Gemma New, Principal Conductor of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Conductor Gemma New was called to replace Conductor Marta Gardolinska who had to withdraw due to a serious family illness.

A successful Polish conductor, Ms Gardolinska champions Polish composers. For that reason, Grazyna Bacewicz’s Overture opened the program. The music did not have its premiere until 1945. Bacewicz began as a violinist at the Warsaw Conservatory. In the 1930s she studied with the famous teacher, Nadia Boulanger, in Paris. This overture has so much great music in such a short time; it runs only 6 minutes. It is stunning to realize this and other works came forth from a terrible historic time. Warsaw began its rebellion to try to shake off the German hold, August 1, 1944. The Soviet Union’s Red Army did not bring the expected aide. The soldiers parked outside Warsaw, allowing the Germans to kill another quarter of a million Poles. As they left, the Germans set off the dynamite and wiring to explode and destroy all of Warsaw. In the midst of this, Bacewicz’s mind was active. The timpani opens and playful strings join in. She uses dissonance and some abrasive sounds, but it is always a musical language that one believes. There is a lovely and strong flute and then an exciting, delightful forward charge for the orchestra. I hope we may hear more of Grazyna Bacewicz

Sir Edward Elgar, 1857-1934

Pablo Ferrandez, ‘cellist

Elgar’s ‘Cello Concerto in E minor is one of my favorite pieces of music. I am a choreographer and chose the last two movements of this work to choreograph and perform as part of a dance concert on the program of Britain Meets the Bay, sponsored by the British Council. To choreograph this music, I listened to it maybe more often than the composer and also studied the war. On this program, the ‘cellist was Pablo Ferrandez. He has a unique approach to the music, playing it in his own interpretation. He occasionally bows very slowly across the ‘cello producing a disappearing sound. His touring this season includes major orchestras across the US: Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Seattle. In Europe he will perform in London, Rotterdam, Dusseldorf and more. Conductor Gemma New led Ferrandez and the SFS engaging them in the strength and agony of the music.

Felix Mendelssohn, 1809-1847, composer and accomplished painter, linguist, poet. This is a watercolor of Lucerne by Mendelssohn.

Felix Mendelssohn’s Symphony #3 was dedicated to Queen Victoria. Mendelssohn, the Queen, and Prince Albert would gather and play new pieces by Mendelssohn. They formed a true friendship. In his program note, Larry Rothe mentions that Mendelssohn dropped the “Scottish” part of the title. There are sounds that can remind one of the winds sweeping around the islands and the mist that clings to buildings and people walking. The opening of the Symphony may recall the murder of Mary, Queen of Scots’ probable lover. However, no story line appears. One may identify sounds that could be developed from the wind itself. This is also about relationships between disparate sounds, how they oppose other sounds, and demonstrate they are alive by the motion of the rhythms. The music travels through moments when one could imagine folk dancers out doors, but an adagio appears after that mode to a contemplative, mysterious movement beyond specific thoughts. Once more, the music leads ahead of any “ideas” to label it. The quiet of the symphony changes to a sense of victory leaving behind any mysteries or cold winds. It reassembles itself and carries on. This is a great symphony. Oh, I wrote that at the beginning. It bears repetition. Listen to Mendelssohn’s Symphony #3, again.

Please note: A post about conductors who are women will follow this tomorrow.

BARTOK’S FAIRY TALE OPERA: SF SYMPHONY’S BLUEBEARD

BELA BARTOK’S DUKE BLUEBEARD’S CASTLE: MICHELLE DeYOUNG AS JUDITH & GERALD FINLEY AS BLUEBEARD

Part II: A FAIRY TALE OPERA

When the French author, Charles Perrault, published his story Barbe-bleu/Blue Beard, 1697, themes from the story had appeared in the 15thc. The themes included serial murders of wives and the importance for young women to obey their husbands in all details. When Bela Bartok decided that writing an opera would give his reputation a lift, he chose Bluebeard. It was to be his first and only opera. He wrote it in 1911 and entered it in a competition for a one act opera. It was refused. He offered it to the Hungarian National Opera; they also dismissed it as impossible to stage.

Bartok returned to his ethnomusicology researching music in Hungary’s forests and villages. During World War I, he returned to composing. The Hungarian National Opera asked Bartok for a ballet; it was The Wooden Prince. It debuted in 1917 and was a great success. After the warm reception for the ballet, the HNO made a double bill by adding Duke Bluebeard’s Castle. Unfortunately, it had mixed reviews. It was, after all, a very dark story.

This was an era that sought knowledge of human psychology and brought forth theories of the unconscious. Sigmund Freund published Totem and Taboo, 1913. Carl Jung’s Psychology of the Unconscious appeared in 1912. Symbolism was a popular trend in literature and music. Debussy composed an opera of Maerterlinck’s Pelias et Melisande.The Barbe-bleu story inspired Maeterlinck’s play, Arione et Barbe-bleu

The performance, at Davies Symphony Hall, March 3rd, began with narration spoken by actor Breezy Leigh. Her introduction suggests that the strange story might be inside of the listeners. It never was a history; it may be a struggle in our psyches.

Esa-Pekka Salonen, Music Director of the SF Symphony, Conducts Duke Bluebeard’s Castle with singers Michelle DeYoung and Gerald Finley.

Despite the grim, gory story, maybe because of those aspects, the music and singing completely captured our attention. The singers became the characters. Mezzo-soprano, Michelle DeYoung, as Judith truly projected the new wife’s innocence, curiosity, proud demands she made of her host. Ms DeYoung’s voice was well suited to the emotions rebounding from happy to terrified. Gerald Finley, bass-baritone as Duke Bluebeard was splendid and horrible as the master of the Castle and keeper of his wives. SF Symphony’s Music Director, Esa-Pekka Salonen, conducted the orchestra and singers with a deep understanding of mysteries contained in Bartok’s opera. He kept faith with Bartok.

This story is different from the Perrault tale. In Perrault’s, there are 6 wives, all dead, and hanging from hooks on the walls of an underground chamber flooded with blood. I remember that image from long ago when I read the story. The young wife is not given a name. Duke Bluebeard marries the younger sister of a neighbor family, leaves his castle, gives the new wife the keys. He warns her not to go into the chamber. She invites her relatives and friends to a party at the Castle. While the party continues, she sneaks away to open that chamber. She runs away from the bloody scene, dropping the key for that room. It is stained with blood that will not wash off. Duke Bluebeard returns, sees the key, and threatens to kill her, but his new wife asks for a last prayer with her sister. As Bluebeard attacks her, her sister and brothers kill the killer. The Castle and riches now belong to her. With her new wealth, she helps her siblings to marry well.

Blue Beard Illustration by Walter Crane

In Duke Bluebeard’s Castle, there are only 3 previous wives. Bluebeard takes Judith on a tour of the Castle. She asks for keys to each locked chamber. He tries to convince her not to examine all the rooms. She sticks to her position. The rooms contain things that show Judith more about her husband. This work considers colors like Prometheus does. There is a room with torture tools, the light goes red; another room has armaments, the light is yellow; a room full of jewels has golden light; a garden is blue-green; the fifth room shows Bluebeard’s properties in bright white light; the sixth is a lake of tears in shadow. Lighting is by Luke Kritzeck. Duke Blue Beard gave Judith chances to leave, but she insisted. She had the deadly virtue of sticking with her plan. Determination is her downfall. A lake of tears? Run, Judith, run! She wants the key to the seventh chamber. The room is barely lit, but she sees three wives: the love of his dawns, his love of noons, the love of evenings. Judith will be his love of night. She will become mute and isolated. He leaves and locks the door.

Photos by Brandon Patoc, courtesy of the SF Symphony

Scriabin & Bartok; Prometheus & Bluebeard- San Francisco Symphony

Part I: A Happening at the SF Symphony – Prometheus, Poem of Fire

The SF Symphony presented extraordinary works by Alexander Scriabin and Bela Bartok at Davies Symphony Hall, March 1-3. Prometheus, the giant Titan in Greek mythic history, was a rebel. He stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans. He was punished by being imprisoned on a rock where a scavenging bird would forever tear out bits of Prometheus’ liver.

Scriabin’s Prometheus, the Poem of Fire, Op. 60 (1911) is the product of Scriabin’s belief that music could call forth visible colors, lights, and aromas. He wanted all those arts to be present in a grand Mysterium. Yes, it anticipated Happenings of 1968. He bought land in Darjeeling, India, and planned to have his ecstatic performances take place there. In the era of Scriabin’s work, there was exploration of spirituality, fabulous contact with unknown forces; Scriabin’s theater would enhance it all with “lights and mists.” His plans for the Mystery were never fulfilled.

Esa-Pekka Salonen, Music Director of San Francisco Symphony, Conducts Prometheus, Poem of Fire; Jean-Ives Thibaudet at the Piano, photo by Brandon Patoc

The project at Davies Symphony Hall was the result of collaboration among Esa-Pekka Salonen, composer and Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony, Jean-Ives Thibaudet, acclaimed pianist, and Mathilde Laurent, in–house perfumer of Cartier. The SF Symphony Chorus added human voices to the music. This threesome of all-star leading artists must have enjoyed creating a grand performance from the mystery which Scriabin had left in tantalizing suggestions. In recent years, the concept of Synesthesia has found proof that about 3%-5% of the population does see colors matching sounds. Scriabin believed it was within everyone, but that has not been shown, not yet. The performance was fascinating. The music, sometimes light or intermittent, was interesting and able to weave the lights, colors, and scent into unified senses.

Example of lights which changed with connections to music. Photo by Brandon Patoc

There is a circular design of colored lights above the stage. The program shows that six of them are directly connected to musical notes. For example, F sharp and G flat are both in one dark purple circle. A flat is alone in red. The six notes that do not have designated notes are different colors: dark brown, orange, light brown, light green, and two dark green circle lights. Luke Kritzeck is Lighting Designer.

Three perfumes whirled into the hall. Mathilde Laurent created perfumes specifically for moments of the Prometheus story. At the beginning, “Avant/Before,” expresses earthy existence: rain, thunder, ice, vegetation. The second perfume, “XIII Heure/ The 13^th hour,” represents the climax of the story and the music: Prometheus gives the gift of fire to humans. The three collaborating artists consider that gift is the source of human creativity, the origin of the arts. The final scent, “L’Apres/After,” shows the creatures now fully human and must be masters of their destiny. Ms Laurent chose bergamot, verbena, fresh grass conveying light and warmth. Various arts become the whole art: Jean-Ives Thibaudet making music by playing the piano, Mathilde Laurent creating scents to express the developing character of human life, Esa-Pekka Salonen to conduct and combine the arts and their artistry. Ms Laurent felt the scents sent forth the “joy and hope” Scriabin and his present collaborators hoped would move us all in a grand union.

Photos by Brandon Patoc courtesy of the San Francisco Symphony.

IGOR LEVIT IGNITES DAVIES HALL; Part I, Beethoven

Igor Levit, the astonishing, internationally celebrated pianist, came to San Francisco for a two week residency with the San Francisco Symphony. He performed four different programs plus an open rehearsal. The last of the four was a recital with surprises throughout. It added up to eight performances. Each one was remarkable for Levit’s brilliance as a pianist, his deep knowledge of the repertoire, and his musical choices. The Hedgehogs attended three of the four: all Beethoven, June 17; Busoni’s immense piano concerto, June 22; a recital with works by Brahms, Fred Hersch, Wagner, and Liszt, June 27. We were unable to hear the chamber music concert with members of the SFS. It must have been very fine, but our three musical banquets were quite filling for hearing, seeing, and thinking. In fact, they were also entertaining. This is the first of three articles about Igor Levit’s performances.

Igor Levit describes himself as “Citizen. European. Pianist.”

The first concert series offered two of the most well known Beethoven masterpieces: the Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat major, Opus 73, called Emperor (1809), and the Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, Opus 55, Eroica (1803). It was good to start our experience with Levit with music that is grand, complex, inventive and which we have heard before. I am not suggesting one could hum along, only that a listener’s memory might be able to imagine what Levit was doing with these landmarks of Western civilization.

He climbed inside the music. His partnership with the SF Symphony was a great match. The SFS, conducted by Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen, played with strength and truth. It was not backing up the Visiting Artist; they were partners in creating their understanding of Beethoven’s music. As Levit stated in an interview with Corinna da Fonseca-Wolfheim in the SFS program book, “my goal is not to sound like Beethoven. What I do all day long is try to understand, why did Beethoven decide to write a piece this way and not the other way? But at the end of the day, I’m the one who plays it, not him. So, the goal is kind of to have it both ways.”

The “Emperor” concerto premiered, in 1809. Musicologists have considered it the apex or fulfillment of Beethoven’s “heroic era,” though this concerto came a year after the 1802-1808 noted as an era of prodigious creativity. Beethoven found a totally original way to open the concerto. The stunning beginning would awaken the audience to the realization that they were experiencing music presented in a new way, and they would need to listen in a new way, too.

Ludwig Van Beethoven, Composer (1770-1827)

The first movement is the longest Beethoven wrote. It is inventive in every facet. Curiously, it is the increasing presence of dissonance that serves as an audio seasoning and builds excitement. Beethoven then brings in quiet moments which stand out even more in contrast with the vigorous new movement. Levit let the Adagio un poco mosso run right into the final movement, Rondo: Allegro ma non troppo which became a frequent way to perform this concerto. The first movement is very long; this combination balances the music in real time. It spurs the music audibly onward and upward. The slower movement presents two chorales; first one for the piano, and then one in the orchestra. There is just a slight change of rhythm in the piano’s accompaniment. Being slightly off of the orchestra’s rhythm focuses the piano carrying the melody.

As Beethoven rounds the course he created for himself and the “Emperor,” he allows a breath of silence and lowers the pitch of the music. The finale allows a new theme to take a powerful bow in the appropriate tempo. Now, a Beethoven special: a romping German folk dance. The timpani takes over in another quiet moment, and there is an enormous burst of bright stars at the end.

Watching Levit perform is nearly so interesting as hearing him play. Fortunately, his quirks do not go on long enough to take attention away from the glorious music he makes. His first gesture was to hold up his left arm high and a little to the left with palm up but not flatly up. It seemed to express “there we are,” or maybe “this is the music right here.” His gestures and looks were often related to the music and his partners, Conductor Salonen and the SFS. He looked at the orchestra players either to acknowledge their playing or perhaps to send a mental message. He turned his head to see Salonen. Occasionally, he looked out to the audience and up to the audience in the choir loft as well. He leaned back to stretch his legs under the piano. Although one Bay Area writer observed that Levit was doing these motions because he felt so good about being in San Francisco, I saw him do the same exercises/expressions/quirks in a video of him performing the “Emperor” at the 2020 Nobel prize concert. It is him. Why would he pretend?

After many, many curtain calls, Igor Levit played one of Felix Mendelssohn’s Songs Without Words, Opus 30, “Consolation.” It was calming, quiet, heartfelt, beautiful. The audience, gasping, cheering, and applauding kept clapping, but he was gone for now. Mr. Levit’s residency was off to a tremendous start

Esa-Pekka Salonen, Music Director, San Francisco Symphony.

The San Francisco Symphony was stellar and brilliant performing the “Eroica.” Music Director/Conductor Salonen kept the orchestra in carefully ordered form. This symphony is written so that the audience cannot anticipate what will happen next in the music. Even though the “Eroica” keeps the classical form of four movements, what Beethoven does within the form is new. The second movement, “Marcia funebre: Adagio assai,” has the funereal feeling and pace. While this Symphony No. 3 was composed, Europe was on fire with revolutions and imperial wars. There would be many military burials and also soldiers with dire injuries visible in all towns. Conductor Salonen did not let the music sit in sadness. He kept it active and alive, as much the march, not only a funeral. That approach meant that it was not a huge departure when the third movement, Scherzo: Allegro vivace, rushes on the scene. The music propels itself as though on quickly moving feet. At the final movement, the theme splits itself in two directions which grow into twelve variations. Multiple layers of music and multiple actions make an amazingly full, lively world. This is where Beethoven meant to go. The audience was treated to a fresh, exciting, Symphony No. 3. Salonen and the SFS made it new.

SF Symphony: War Requiem by Benjamin Britten

May 18, 2023, Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco – The San Francisco Symphony performed the enormous and heartbreaking War Requiem, Opus 66 (1961) with soloists Jennifer Holloway, soprano; Ian Bostridge, tenor; Brian Mulligan, baritone; the San Francisco Symphony Chorus with Joshua Habermann, guest conductor; and the Ragazzi Boys Chorus with Kent Jue artistic and executive director conducting. The soloists, soprano, bass, and tenor performed with deep understanding of the texts and, in addition to the power of their voices, communicated the painful emotions of this work.

Britten assembled a multitude of artists in groups and individuals, not as one voice and not with one anthem. There were two different and sometimes opposing texts: the Catholic mass for the dead, Missa pro defunctis, and poetry by Wilfred Owen, one of England’s World War I poets. There are nine of Owen’s poems. In case you are not familiar with Wilfred Owen’s work, it is worthwhile to know that he fought in the war but was not enthusiastic for it. Before the war, Owen had considered entering the ministry. Beginning December, 1916, he was on active duty in France, then spent 5 months in a hospital, then was sent back to France. He received the Military Cross award. He fought in the trenches, saw hideous wounds and deaths among his comrades, and, while leading his company across the Sambre Canal, was killed by machine gun fire. His death was on November 4, one week before the Armistice.

Benjamin Britten, composer (1913-1976)

In Britten’s Requiem, the mixed chorus and the full orchestra perform texts from the Missa pro defunctis in Latin. The male soloists with a chamber sized group of the orchestra sing the Owen texts in English. The Ragazzi Chorus is not seen. It sings its parts of the Missa from behind the wall enclosing the chorus loft. Their sound is quiet and sounds as though coming from a great distance.

Britten uses all traditional parts of the Missa: Requiem aeternam, Dies irae, Offertorium, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, then closing with Libera me. In this music, these sections become an opera of belief and also condemnation. The solo soprano is in the chorus loft with the Symphony Chorus, but they are behind her on their higher rows. She sits alone in the front and lowest row. She appears like a figurehead on a ship or the ancient Oracle, even though she declaims Christian faith and imperatives. Her first majestic singing is in the Dies irae. The chorus does not adopt her outlook. Instead, they sound weak and doubtful. Then, in an example of the opposition of the Latin text and Owen’s poems, the tenor and baritone sing from the deeply ironic poem, “The Next War.”

Wilfred Owen, soldier, poet (1893-1918)

If one had merely listened to the unique orchestration and the use of bells and many versions of percussion including tambourine, triangle, castanets, Chinese blocks, snare drums, bass and tenor drum, that listener may have awakened to Owen’s poem, The Parable of the Old Man and the Young. It is sung by the tenor and bass with the chamber orchestra. It is Wilfred Owen’s answer to the story of Abraham taking Isaac to a place of sacrifice. Abraham begins to follow G-d’s request to sacrifice Isaac, but then an angel, sent by G-d, stops him, saving Abraham from the murder of his son and saving Isaac’s life.

In the Owen poem, Abraham kills his son. The music is harsh, discordant, and, despite the horror of the death, it is worse because it is roughly torn from the story most listeners will know. As that breath taking, wrenching event is told, the boys of the Ragazzi can be heard singing softly, far away.

“When lo! An angel called him out of heaven,/Saying, lay not thy hand upon the lad,/Neither do anything to him. Behold,/A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;/Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him./But the old man would not so, but slew his son, -And half the seed of Europe, one by one.”

Rather than the war to end all wars, this was a war that killed a generation of men.

The Sanctus opens with the soprano magnificently singing while the chorus chants. It has become a song of praise. The last movement, Libera me (Deliver me) the Baritone sings“I am the enemy you killed, my friend/I knew you in this dark; for so you frowned/Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed./ I parried, but my hands were loath and cold.”

Together the tenor and baritone sing: “Let us sleep now…” as though they have learned from engaging in the battle with each other, as though they could go forward peacefully. They cannot do it; they are dead.

(L to R) Jennifer Holloway, soprano; Ian Bostridge, tenor; Brian Mulligan, baritone

The War Requiem ends with the boys’ chorus, mixed chorus, and soprano singing “May angels lead you into Paradise,/may the martyrs receive you” and “Grant them eternal rest, O Lord,/and let everlasting light shine upon them./May they rest in peace. Amen.”

The prayer sounds peaceful. Their rest could be tranquil. I do not think we have traveled through the War Requiem in order to believe the dead, piled up like giant haystacks, are all better now.

Benjamin Britten was a pacifist. Wilfred Owen, after having considered a life devoted to a church, found that he could not trust the institution of churches. He could find no Christ in the churches because killing was not only allowed, but supported. The Agnus Dei/Lamb of G-d section of the Missa, repeats “Lamb of G-d, who takes away the sins of the world,/grant us peace. “ But they sing “Grant us peace.” only once.

A portrait of the composer Benjamin Britten from 1948.

Sibelius, Joshua Bell, Sibelius, SF Symphony: Spectacular

SF Symphony, Davies Hall, San Francisco, April 27, 2023: The program opened with Nautilus by Anna Meredith. Composed in 2011, this was its first SF Symphony performance. It is extremely challenging to write about this concert. When I think of this evening of music, I shake my head a bit and widen my eyes. Which superlatives are adequate? Joshua Bell was the soloist for Violin Concerto in D minor, Opus 47 (1905), by Jean Sibelius. Dalia Stasevska conducted. The SF Symphony performed Symphony No. 2 in D major, Opus 43 (1902), by Sibelius. Every moment of that music was powerful, urgent, necessary. Both of the Sibelius works sound like no other concerto or symphony. It was thrilling to hear and see this music. It was a stupendous, spectacular, over the top wonderful performance. Each SFS musician, Bell, and Stasevska were playing at the height of physical and mental experience. The Sibelius works are virtuosic masterpieces. The Violin Concerto demands the most intricate, masterful technique possible. Sibelius had dreams of becoming a violin virtuoso but instead moved further in his composing. The Concerto was written by someone who knew every bit of what a violin could do in the hands of a singular master; Joshua Bell is the person Sibelius dreamed of for this music.

Jean Sibelius, composer (1865 – 1957)

The Concerto opens with a strong, almost other-worldly presentation that introduces the soloist’s amazing abilities with the relatively small instrument that is able to take the audience immediately into the sky as on a test jet, hum a lullaby, make our heads float on a cloud, and then brings us into a dark forest without a compass. Sibelius is not interested in comfort for the audience or the soloist. A cadenza, an improvisational passage played by the soloist or a written, fancifully decorated passage, usually comes as a climax. Sibelius was not interested in “usually.” A written cadenza is the heart of the first movement, Allegro moderato. The stamp of Virtuoso is pressed into every movement by the soloist. Joshua Bell absorbs the entire score into his physical being. It takes movement to make music, and, at the same time, the music which is created by movements then shapes the movements of the player. It is fascinating to see Mr. Bell express the music with each movement of his back, the hands manipulating the violin and bow, the step forward that happens when the energy of making music changes where the weight is placed in the body, and a foot comes down.

Joshua Bell, violinist

The second movement, Adagio di molto, is beautiful in a new way that Sibelius found to be beautiful. Sometimes it is the solo violin, sometimes the clarinet and bassoon, and then back to the soloist, a flute, the strings. All is quiet. It is a soft sensation. Was it because the music was soft to hear or was it making a softness the listener will remember as something one could touch or something that touched her? Allegro ma non tanto is the third movement. It has everything. It drives onward, it dances on beats we cannot count, flies and looks like it could crash, but it drives ahead and in spirals. Joshua Bell is unleashed – if there was ever the least restraint – as themes from throughout the Concerto propel this rocket. Sir Donald Tovey, the musicologist, composer, orchestra director, made that comment about a “polonaise for polar bears,” but he did not intend to demean Sibelius’ Violin Concerto at all. He also wrote: “… I have not met a more original, a more masterly, and a more exhilarating work than the Sibelius violin concerto.” The opening night audience, April 27, at Davies appropriately went wild applauding. After perhaps 4 (or 5) curtain calls, Mr. Bell appeared with his violin. He and Wyatt Underhill, the SFS Assistant Concertmaster, played an encore. Mr. Bell announced it as a little tune by Shostakovich. It was an excerpt from Shostakovich’s Five Pieces for Two Violins. It was a lovely, quiet beauty. The audience, giddy from getting an encore, applauded more and longer, but they had to be satisfied by the greatness they had already heard and seen.

In theater, actors are taught to listen to the other characters. One cannot rehearse lines in one’s head; that would set the actor apart from the action. I have a strong image of Mr. Bell waiting for his entries into the music. He is listening. He looks at the conductor. He is hearing it all and ready, completely occupied by the music. One time I saw him quickly pull a hair from his bow. He immediately returned to his focus.

There was a wonderful, silent communication between Dalia Stasevska and Joshua Bell. In one moment while he played, she faced him with her arms reaching out as though saying, “yes, yes, keep on just as you are.” Her gestures while conducting are strong, direct, clear. She shows the strength of her intent in every movement. Ms Stasevska is sought after by many orchestras mostly everywhere. She is the Chief Conductor of Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Artistic Director of the International Sibelius Festival, the Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. This season she performed with the Chicago, Toronto, Montreal Symphonies, the New York and Los Angeles Philharmonics.

Dalia Stasevska

The Symphony No. 2 in D minor, Opus 43 (1902) is another example of Sibelius’ grand, intelligent creativity. He wanted an abstract work designed so the music itself produces the music. Elements of the work seem to talk with other aspects of music and time. He supplied no story, no reference to Finnish folklore, and was not now even inspired by Finnish traditions. He stepped into the deep end and came up with something Sibelius that neither he nor others had thought of before. However, art is not always received by the onlooker or listener in the way the creator meant it to be. Finnish musicologists, audiences, and critics heard it as music for their resistance against Tsar Nicholas II. Finland was part of the Russian empire, but the Finns asserted their independence. When it had its premiere, Ilmari Krohn, Finnish critic, called this symphony “our liberation symphony.” Sibelius did not join in that description, but that mark has lasted.

Jean Sibelius

Sibelius’s father passed away when Jean was only 3 years old. He and his mother moved to his widowed, maternal grandmother’s home. He was fortunate that he had a paternal uncle who was interested in music and gave him a violin at age 10. An aunt taught him to play the piano, but the violin was his first love. He and his brother and sister would play trios. Jean started composing short pieces and recorded them on paper. In 1883, on the subject of composing, he wrote, “They (his compositions) are rather poor, but it is nice to have something to do on a rainy day.” He was 18 at that time. When his Symphony No. 2 was premiered he wrote that “My Second Symphony is a confession of the soul.” The Symphony’s four movements all seem to grow from the first movement, Allegretto. it is like a family of four; they are not alike but one can see/hear their origins. The second movement, Tempo andante ma rubato, is totally different than the activity and continuous movement of the Allegretto. The SF Symphony was powerful, as inspired by Sibelius and led by Conductor Stasevska. The SFS never ran off the tracks though it moved through the different directions and meters like a train running in the air. The Andante was suddenly heart-rending, quiet, and full of longing. The last two movements, Vivacissimo–lento e soave and Allegro moderato bring all the passengers together, joined in a new reality. The music is the creator, peacemaker, and promise. The Finnish audiences were thrilled in 1902 just as we are in 2023. Their critics wrote it “exceeded even the boldest expectations,” Oskar Merikanto, composer. “An absolute masterpiece,” Evert Katila. Nothing less. A spectacular performance.

Marsalis, Tarkiainen, Shostakovich: Great Music@Davies Hall

San Francisco, April 23, 2023, Davies Symphony Hall: The San Francisco Symphony presented a program of three different kinds of music and demonstrated their ability to excel in all of them. It was an exciting experience: one could not hear any of the stunning music and anticipate what would come next. Guest Conductor Cristian Macelaru showed us his understanding of great music originating in America, Lapland/Finland, Russia. He was a masterful leader letting the music stay in front and have its way. One can see why he is the music director of the Orchestre National de France, chief conductor of the WDR Sinfonieorchester, and music director and conductor of the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music. He lives in music, a universal language.

Wynton Marsalis, composer, musician, educator

Two movements from Wynton Marsalis’ Blues Symphony opened the program. They were terrific: complicated, fun, exciting, thrilling, sophisticated music. There is only one problem with the performance: where are the other five movements? Great as the two we got to hear are, it made me ready for the entire Blues Symphony, and soon. The Blues Symphony premiered in 2009, performed by the Atlanta Symphony. This was its first SF Symphony performance. Mr. Marsalis believes that jazz needs to have its history codified. He knows that the music lives across generations and even centuries. Felix Mendelssohn revived Bach. Bach was dismissed as a music “mathematician.” His work was ignored. Thanks to Mendelssohn’s great-aunt, grandmother, father, and his tutor Zelter, all of whom found Bach manuscripts and encouraged 15 year old Felix Mendelssohn. Then, Felix re-discovered the St. Matthew Passion. After 5 years of preparation, Mendelssohn presented its second debut, 102 years after its first. The link between those composers gave the 21st century the knowledge and beauties of Bach.To give jazz the respect it deserves, and to recognize its contributions to other kinds of music and other cultures, Mr. Marsalis has adopted the continuing and massive effort of delineating jazz history. Styles come and go, but music lasts. Marsalis wants “to further the legacy of George Gershwin, James P. Johnson, Leonard Bernstein, John Lewis, Gunther Schuller, and others.” Musicians and composers know what went before them. They grow through it, make it their own, and keep it alive.

In tonight’s program, presented first was Reconstruction Rag, the third movement of the Blues Symphony.

Wynton Marsalis (born 1961 in New Orleans)

Sean Colonna wrote the program note for this performance. He mentions the elements of jazz at the turn of the 19th century into the 20th: ragtime and the “‘African Mystique’ that fascinated white audiences.” I would add that the fascination for many white audiences was as though the musicians came from another, lesser planet. That’s the “Reconstruction” of it. Remember what happened after the Civil War? African-Americans were placed in situations that robbed them and punished them for their new freedoms. Despite ragtime’s bumptious charm and rhythms, there is a kernel of the blues at the heart of this extraordinary music. There are many layers of sound and rhythm spiraling around the heady, engaging rag. The music that sounds so gay can mislead you into thinking the movement is only about a party except there is more. Big City Breaks, the next movement played, is the fifth movement of the Symphony. It is the embodiment of the sounds and music of New York City especially in the rich Bebop era which produced and fostered so many heroic, creative musicians and composers. There are traffic noises, a police whistle, a lot of percussion. Once again there are layers of sounds interrupting other sounds, tunes, rhythms. So many places to look: across the street, up to the high walls of skyscrapers, people dressed in their finery, people looking out for the bus. Again, there are multiple meanings to the movement’s title; there are all kinds of breaks. I think of break dancing on the streets, I think of the break that comes in a tap dance step, a break that gives one a better job. And someone or something that seeks to break you, your will, and your heart. Therefore, I am impatiently tapping my toe until I get to hear the whole Blues Symphony.

Outi Tarkiainen, composer

This was the US Premiere of Ms Tarkiainen’s beautiful contribution to the concert, Milky Ways, written in 2022. It was commissioned by the SF Symphony. The piece is a concerto for English horn and orchestra. It was entirely new and different in so many ways. She expresses her connection to the natural world and desires that her music involves her audience without ever abandoning the music itself. She is quoted describing the interaction of humans and music, “I see music as a force of nature that can flood over a person and even change entire destinies.” The English horn, played by Russ de Luna, SFS English horn, was called upon to wrap a delicate web around the atmosphere that humans live in. His performance was powerful in its expressive beauty. There are three movements: The Infant Gaze, Interplays, At the Fountainhead of God. As a female composer, she does not dodge defining herself as a female living a life determined by her connection to nature and earth. She had no embarrassment or coverup for talking to the audience about mother milk. The Greeks, she said, observed the sky, saw a vast display of stars, and called it the Milky Way because it is like a long stripe of spilled milk. There is also the other milky way that infants, human and otherwise, experience to nourish them and receive love. The mother and baby dream; the mother wakes to the baby’s face and sees it as a “gift from God.” Another breakthrough in this music is that for decades if not centuries, women entering lives that had long been available only to men, would surely not want their work to be considered delicate. Ms Tarkiainen’s music is delicate and powerful simultaneously. She has found that strength in gentleness. When the lights on the stage turned down, and there was no light but over each music stand, Mr. de Luna slowly walked on a diagonal line from center to upstage left and off. The music captures the audience through sound and live image. A brilliant premiere. The SF Symphony performed with grace and strength.

Dmitri Shostakovich, composer (1906 – 1975)

Symphony No. 1 in F minor, Opus, 10. This listener had never heard Symphony No. 1 before this presentation. It allows a brief reverie wondering about the Shostakovich who had not yet been persecuted by Stalin and his vicious toadies. This symphony was written in 1925. He wrote it as his graduation project for the Leningrad Conservatory, in Leningrad/St. Petersburg. Russia. He was, however, already Shostakovich. Symphony No. 1 was premiered in public, in Leningrad, a year later, after it helped him pass his exams. It was a hit. He received immediate recognition as an artist whose work would be allowed to tour outside of the Soviet Union. This led to a performance with the Berlin Philharmonic, led by Bruno Walter, 1927, and, ultimately to the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Leopold Stokowski, 1928. The music is magnificent; there is no need to dwell on the composer’s youth. The orchestration allows solos for the violin, cello, and piano. It becomes personal, reaching from the instruments to the audience directly, as though the composer sets these musicians apart to carry a message. These solo moments were performed with virtuoso skill and heart by the SF Symphony artists. The four movements have purposefully chaotic moments, the Shostakovich irony and hint of sarcasm, and bright, energetic passages that beg the orchestra to go ahead and dance. Shostakovich’s individualistic eye cannot help but express his environment, a world in tatters, a yearning for hope to exist. He knew his world. In retrospect, he is almost prophetic of what lies ahead. This is not the Symphony of a beginner in life or art.

Jean-Yves Thibaudet & Debussy

Sunday, March 26, Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco: Jean-Yves Thibaudet performed Claude Debussy’s Preludes, Books 1 and 2 and blew the minds of everyone in the hall. These Debussy works are seldom heard all together. Maybe some extraordinary pianist would perform the Preludes of one of the Books or possibly one or a few of the Preludes, but who would or could perform all of them? So far as I know, only M. Thibaudet. The Preludes are works for solo piano. Each “Book” has 12 of them. Not one of them is like any of the others, except for their miniature form: each is between two and four minutes long.

Claude Debussy, composer (1862 – 1918)

These pieces are not the prelude to something else; they may be brief, but each one is a world in itself. Frederic Chopin wrote 24 Preludes but they did not have names or descriptions. Debussy’s are written with each one having a descriptive word according to its meter or mood. The first one of Book 1 is “Lent et grave,” slow and serious. However, Debussy also gives each one a descriptive title that appears at the end of each prelude. In the first one of Book 1 it is “Danseuses de Delphes,” The Dancers of Delphi. Another one in Book 1, the third prelude, has Anime as its traditional heading: Animated. The descriptive name at the end: “Le Vent dans le plaine/suspend son haleine;” “The wind over the plain/Holds its breath.” This is one of the literary quotations or references that appear in the Preludes. The phrase may be from Charles Simon-Favart, an 18th century composer and playwright. Later, the French poet Paul Verlaine used it as a heading for his poem, “L’extase langoureuse.” In 1874. Debussy had made a song of Verlaine’s poem. These artists are in tune with their culture, whether it is the culture of a century ago or current.

Jean-Ives Thibaudet, French pianist who lives in Los Angeles

Capricieux et leger, the 11th Prelude of Book 1, also has the title, “La Danse de Puck.” The Puck of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a playful jokester. The music of this Prelude has the liveliness of Puck’s flying and jumping and his occasionally trouble-making character. Debussy loved Shakespeare and was also an anglophile. In Book 2, the 9th Prelude is Grave, Hommage a S. Pickwick, Esq. P.P.M.P.C.. It honors Samuel Pickwick from Charles Dickens’s first book, The Pickwick Papers.

M. Thibaudet always dresses elegantly. This time, he appeared in black. From where I was sitting I saw him well but may have missed details, except for his shoes. I could see the bright bar across the top of his foot. I mention this because it drew my eye to his feet. In the program notes, James M. Keller quotes composer Alfredo Casella, a Debussy contemporary, who also took note of Debussy’s feet: “Moreover, he used the pedals in a way all his own.” I am convinced that M. Thibaudet did so, too. Most of the time, I could see only the downstage foot (the foot closest to the audience). The upstage foot must have been exactly parallel and doing its own pedal thing.

Here is more from Alfredo Casella on Debussy’s playing: “…his sensibility of touch was incomparable; he made the impression of playing directly on the strings of the instrument with no intermediate mechanism; the effect was a miracle of poetry.”

This is an apt description of M. Thibaudet’s playing as well.

While it is entertaining to glance through the traditional citations and names like “Modere (Brouillards) Moderate…Mists, it would be a terrible mistake to disregard the beauty and difficulty of the music. No one in the audience could fail to realize the magnificence of M. Thibaudet’s performance. It was literally stunning to watch and listen. Each Prelude has its own meter, a special tone, a unique set of technical challenges. The pianist does not have a through-line of theme or color or emotion. The Preludes are a celebration of the particular. Attention to the most challenging individual elements of the pianist’s technique cannot waver. It is more intense and requires more precision than an Olympic Decathlon and probably as much strength and energy.

Jean-Yves Thibaudet performed something that maybe no one since Debussy himself has done, or done so well. He took the challenge of performing both Books and embraced the vast variety and individual beauties of the Preludes. It could be compared to tight rope walking between two high rise buildings while playing master level chess. The audience cheered and applauded for at least 5 curtain calls. M. Thibaudet succumbed to the audience’s raptures and played Sir Edward Elgar’s Salut d’Amour as his encore. It was a salute to the program’s complexity, charm, originality, and earth-moving beauty. The audience called M. Thibaudet back for another 4 or 5 chances to applaud him before everyone reluctantly realized the music was over for this night.

Jean-Ives Thibaudet will perform the solo program of Debussy’s Preludes throughout the US and Europe this year. He also will appear in recital with Renee Fleming and will tour in the US and Japan with Midori. In addition, he will perform with Itzhak Perlman and Friends in New York City, Michigan, Toronto. The French Ministry of Culture awarded him the title, Officier, in 2012. He is a great artist; don’t miss him.

Hilary Hahn and J.S. Bach

Hilary Hahn’s solo recital on March 12 was truly great. The word astonishing fits except that it is not a surprise when Ms Hahn performs in a way that combines flawless technique with emotion, color, and devotion to the music. While hearing her play three of Johann Sebastian Bach’s works for solo violin, I knew that this was pure Bach. There is no ego or personal style filtering the music. The music did not need such additions; it was exciting, an on-the-edge-of- the-seat experience. It was pure music.

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

The program offered Sonata No. 1 in G minor, BWV 1001; Partita No. 1 in B minor, BWV, 1002; and, after intermission, Partita No. 2 in D minor, BWV 1004.

Hilary Hahn, Violinist

Purity does not mean that it was simple. Every note, every multiple note created a world of sound. Sound is a real, physical thing. It can change the world around it. Sound can move mountains; consider an avalanche.

The Sonata No. 1 in G minor is listed first of Bach’s six works for solo violin. Its parts are Adagio, Fuga: Allegro, Siciliano, Presto. The order of Slow, Fast, Slow, Fast is intentional. It balances classical order with the interweaving of free imagination and openmindedness. There is a mathematical intelligence at play. My college roommate, Leah Johnson Wilcox, was a math major. I knew she knew games of balance and dimensions and that I would never be able to play on that field. Ms Hahn’s superb intelligence is a wonderful match with Bach’s. Together, they explore balance, space, rhythms; they play with time and space. The listener is joyfully immersed in the mathematics of music without really knowing it is happening.

The Partitas have movements named for dances. The Siciliano in Sonata No. 1 is the only dance character in the Sonatas. Baroque dances were crazy complicated in their patterning of order. Partita No. 1 in B minor opens with an Allemande, and then its Double; next comes a Courante and its Double: Presto; Sarabande, and its Double; Tempo di Borea (Bourree) – and its Double. The Double is an ancestor of a jazz variation; it spins out something new from a standard. Here, the music takes off from the musical idea of the dance movement first presented. The rhythms and characters of the dances go beyond a restatement of a physical, 18thc. dance. The music tells us the DNA of a Courante’s running motion or the Sarabande’s dignity and sadness. It is not only the heart of the music in motion; it exposes Bach’s understanding of the electrical pulses and chemical interactions that keep it alive.

Restraint can be beautiful. Order can breathe. These violin solo works are not embroidered or showing off innovation. They combine profound creativity with their classic forms.

There were moments in the recital when I am certain I heard Bach speak. Did Bach invent music? I know that is not true, not entirely true. It only seems that way sometimes. There are not adequate ways to describe Ms Hahn’s greatness. Standing alone on an empty stage, she filled the stage and Davies Hall with her presence and her powerful connection to the music she made.

The Partita No. 2 in G minor shares its format with Partita No. 1 but its Fate led it somewhere else. This one has no Doubles, but it does have five movements: Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Gigue, and Chaconne. The mood of the first four movements is tinged with reflection, controlled order; if we were to use Romantic thoughts we might find regret. The Gigue (Jig) takes rhythm over the mountain, dancing with wild energy which takes the rhythmic demands farther than one could expect, and even farther than that. And then, there is the Chaconne. It is very long, so long as the all the first four movements together. It gives us a theme and then sixty-four variations. I do not remember breathing as I heard this majestic music. It gathers the knowledge of music’s world and, in the last two strokes of the bow, made my heart stop in awe.

For more about Ms Hahn, please see the article at http://www.livelyfoundation.org/wordpress/?p=1359 about her Davies Hall recital on April 26, 2016, with Cory Smythe, pianist. The program included work by Mozart, Bach, Aaron Copland, and Tina Davidson’s Blue Curve of the Earth, the winner of a competition for new encore pieces sponsored by Ms Hahn.

Joshua Bell & Peter Dugan@Davies Symphony Hall: SIMPLY GREAT

Violinist Joshua Bell’s recital at SF Symphony’s Davies Hall, Sunday, December 11, was astounding. With pianist Peter Dugan, Mr. Bell gave us the musical equivalent of a home run with the bases loaded. It was a stunning performance from every perspective: the program selections, the perfection of sound, the integration of violin and piano, the physical presence of Mr. Bell. What have I left out? If there is something missing from that list it is only because I am still envisioning the performance, and it is still breathtaking.

Ludwig Van Beethoven ( 1770-1827)

Since he is so well known, one might imagine the program Mr. Bell would perform would be familiar; instead he presented works that neither I nor the Hedgehog pianist and bass baritone knew. The opening work was a brilliant curtain raiser: Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No. 2 in A Major, Opus 12, no. 2. It was composed in 1797 or 1798 and published in January, 1799. It was a daring, innovative composition. The two instruments are equally featured and truly “play well together,” as a school report sent home might declare. Mr. Bell’s physical movements express the music and also gave him opportunities to turn toward the pianist and physically, visibly demonstrate their relationship. They were not playing the same notes or rhythm but interlacing each instrument’s music to make the music of the sonata. It was a delightful work from the engaging beginning to the middle section’s nostalgic, nearly despairing sound, and the final Allegro suggesting all is well — for the moment.

Pianist Peter Dugan

Robert Schumann (1810-1856)

Robert Schumann’s Sonata No. 2 in D minor, Opus 121 is a hurricane of sound, a stage 4 emotional storm. While the music could be said to crash like the ocean under the hurricane, the composer does not lose his way with his creation. He is in control of his ship. Schumann composed it in 1851, a year of tremendous productivity. He completed 18 works in that year, reworked his Symphony No. 4, plus three overtures, a piano trio, works for piano and violin, lieders; it is an amazing year. Early in 1854, he attempted suicide by jumping into the Rhine. He died in 1856, in an asylum in Bonn. Fortunately for him and us, he was able to create great works before the internal storms incapacitated him. This work also was a new sound for the Hedgehogs. It kept the audience leaning forward, awaiting the next tumult. Despite my descriptions of the Sonata as a hurricane, the work is not a single dimension. There is a graceful lyricism in the first movement and the third, Andante, has a touch of happiness. In all, the Sonata ends by turning toward a hopeful moment. This is an extraordinary way to experience Schumann’s depth.

Joshua Bell

The page for this recital in the program book shows in very small print, “Additional works will be announced from the stage.” Just seeing that one line created a thrill of expectation. In the second half of the performance, the personable, at ease Mr. Bell shone as he took a microphone to introduce the next pieces. It was remarkable to see his relaxed personality apparently talking with each person in the audience though he was talking to thousands of us.

Claude Debussy (1862-1918

The second half was to begin with Claude Debussy’s Violin Sonata in G minor (1917). It was another splendid selection which I do not think I had ever heard. I am grateful to Mr. Bell for choosing it. Debussy was suffering terminal cancer when he wrote it. He worked on it in 1916, put it aside, and finished it in 1917. It is a culmination of the beauties that one hears in Debussy’s music. It demonstrates how strong and lasting something transparent, light, and gentle can be. It could be light in terms of weight but also music as light; it is a real thing which one cannot ever touch. Debussy performed its premiere in Paris, May, 1917, and passed away less than a year later. Although the Debussy was the only work listed for the second half, Mr. Bell and Mr. Dugan actually began with Nigun from Baal Schem Suite by Ernst Bloch. When he introduced the piece, Mr. Bell noted that Bloch was Jewish and, since Chanukah was only a week away, he was proud to present it. He paused exactly the right number of moments and then commented that Ye probably was not in the audience. Albert Camus reflected on the political essence of art; it was a completely justifiable addition to the Joshua Bell and Peter Dugan performance. The music was stunning; original and also embodying tradition, ways of living, ways of surviving. Nigun is said to be a pleading with heaven; Bell and Dugan achieved the effect of reaching deeply into one’s being. Bloch was Swiss, came to the US in 1916, became the Music Director of the Cleveland Institute of Music, then the Director of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and joined the faculty of UC, Berkeley. This Nigun was a marvelous reunion of Bloch and the Bay Area.

Bela Bartok (1881-1945)

One more addition to the program was Bartok’s Rhapsody No. 1. None of these additions were brief or light weight. The Bartok work and the Bloch and the Debussy all existed in different worlds of sound, rhythm, emotion. As one might expect the Bartok piece activated the strange music of the Romanian/Hungarian folk tunes and dances, but that does not mean that the music was as expected. Each section was diverse within the whole and each section had the wild heart of the villages stirring souls and hearing this wildness. Both musicians became completely someone else in each of these remarkable, peak performances. It was an amazing thing to see as well as to hear: a transformation and a musical life in perhaps ten minutes.

Clara Schumann (1819-1896)

Those pieces were considered part of the program. Then, there were the encores! We all must find out what Joshua Bell eats for breakfast and whether he and Peter Dugan prefer running or swimming. The focus of the performers and their energy was amazing. The first encore was Clara Schumann’s Romance #1. Clara Wieck Schumann, married to Robert Schumann with whom she had nine children, was recognized as the finest pianist in Europe. They fell in love when very young. Her father did not approve, but they married. This Romance is one of three, Romances, all fine compositions. This writer has heard it on a cd and on the radio, but it never touched me until hearing it not only live but performed by Bell and Dugan. It is graceful with an underlying power; the performance was eye opening, reminding the listener what Clara Schumann, who toured her performances across Europe, could do if she had had more time to write.

Scherzo-Tarantella by Henryk Wieniawski was the opposite of Clara Schumann’s Romance#1. This was fast and then even faster. It was a mad dance taking its name from the motions of one bitten by a tarantula. Another fantastic, seldom if ever heard piece, this one sent the giddy audience up to the roof top and down again. After sitting for a couple of hours, I believe everyone present felt sure in their nerves and blood that they could prance, run, leap for however much time and music they could have. This concert was beautiful, powerful, and world moving.