SFist Interviews Alisa Weilerstein

At the time, we were hopeful that Prop 8 would fail, so we asked about that: I strongly believe in this cause, she said, and boy speaks she fast! And to play with Leon Fleisher, I would do it anytime, anywhere. But, yeah, I was thrilled we were going to do this together. I know he is really active politically, I really admire that, and it is a cause I strongly believe in as well.

How about Thursday night? This is a program that we played first together in Boston in the celebrity series, and right before we come to San Francisco, we're doing it in New-York. Tonight, actually! I'm so thrilled to play with Inon, we met two years ago and we read together. We played together for fun, I was looking for a pianist, I had heard such fantastic things about him, so we decided to just play through some sonatas together, not rehearsing, just having fun, and we connected very very well

This is a program they've done before. Would she care to elaborate? It's a very interesting program, it's sort of a sandwich: two very well known Sonatas are sandwiching the Kodáli sonata, and we're supposed to play the Chopin Barcarolle and Omaramor. I chose this program because I love every single piece on it and I think they go very well together. The Kodáli sonata is one of my favorite pieces to play anywhere, it's a tour de force for the cellist, and all the Beethoven cello sonatas, but this one is the most interesting and the most bizarre in a way, with the last movement fugue being one of the most puzzling and fascinating movement in the cello literature. There are parts that almost sound like 20th century music, it sounds beyond its own time, just the way it develops, it's very very unusual.

The Chopin sonata, I always tease violinist because we have a great great work written for cellist by Chopin and violinists don't have anything, and usually it's the other way around.

Weilerstein grew in a musical environment, her parents (mom and pop) being touring artists as well, and Alisa performed with them. We were curious how different it is to play with your folks, as opposed to Inon. Well, when I play wiht my parents, there's a deeper bond that with anybody, because we know each other so well, and there is a strong underlying respect. That said, when we rehearse together, we don't sugarcoat anything. It's a very different rehearsing style than when I rehearse with other people... Every experience, whether it's my parents or not, is different from each other. That's what makes it fun.

Talking about musical partner, we caught up with her in a middle of a run in Houston with none other than our own SF Symphony Associate Conductor James Gaffigan. Gaffigan will leave the Symphony at the end of this season, we're sad, we'll miss his, hmmm, candid and youthful energy. Would she spill the beans on him? Oh yes, he's extremely energetic, it's been really fun actually, we just played our first concert last night. It was really wonderful in many ways. One special way that this concert was great is that he requested that I played this Respighi Adagio and Variations in addition to the Tchaikovsky Variations on a Rococo theme. The Tchaikovsky, I play all the time but the Respighi I had never heard of it. So I learned this twelve minute beautiful piece for this concert. That was his request.

Go check Alisa and Inon this Thursday at Herbst at 8pm.