Do you guys remember when Steve Nash played hoops for the Santa Clara Broncos? How he single handedly kicked UCLA's tush? Could you tell he was going to become a mega-star, sure shot into the NBA Hall of Fame? If so, we have another exercise for you to identify diamonds in the rough: the Merola Opera program. It's where the kids who sing go learn their trade, improve their voice, diction, acting and all, and show off their stuff through a series of summer events: a free concert in Yerba Buena gardens, that we missed, two operas (Albert Herring on July 18th and 20th and Don Giovanni on August 1st and 3rd) and a grand finale (August 16th) to wrap up the summer and send the kids home singing Ce n'est qu'un au revoir. Some will then become Adler fellows and perform on the SF Opera stage, and some will become bona fide stars. To know which one, you'll have to listen for that fellow who can hit that three point aria at the buzzer to steal the game.... [continue]

Sometimes, conducting modern music is like driving a car that was designed with 12 wheels, but such that only one can touch the ground at any time. Some kind of tricky balancing act, it gets you somewhere but tensely, with your muscles clenched. And then, the Dvorak New World Symphony is like stepping off that contraption into a mercedes convertible, lifting the top down, stepping on the pedal, and wham, there comes the acceleration pushing you into the plush leather, the wind blowing on your face and the rush of blood to your groin: just plain exhilaration. The snobs will sneer at the bourgeois pleasures, but they're so thoroughly enjoyable. The Summer Series of the SF Symphony is all about giving the audience such easy satisfaction. The program we attended, in addition to the New World Symphony, included a Beethoven piano concerto No. 5, and a Slavonic Dance, again by Dvorak. Easy pleasures don't mean it's dumbed down: those are famous pieces for sure, and no feather will be ruffled the wrong way by the program, but these are still important works, and highly difficult to perform.... [continue]

It's easy to interview someone who is an interviewer: we just ask her to ask the questions! Orli Shaham is the pianist who'll play Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini with the SF Symphony at Stern Grove this Sunday. Rachmaninoff, Paganini: you don't need to know much about music to know that this is all about sheer virtuosity and crazy technicity. But Orli also had her radio show, Dial-A-Musician, where she asked her pro friends in classical music to answer questions from the listeners. Orli is the best person to query: she knows the business from the soloist angle. Then she often plays accompanist to her brother, Gil Shaham, the violinist who visits frequently with the SF Symphony. And if she ever wanted to know the point of view of the conductor, she can ask her husband, David Robertson. Robertson leads the St Louis Symphony, and will be guest conductor of the SF Symphony (starting tonight!) to wrap up the 2007-08 program. As Orli says, "he closes the season, and I open the summer."... [continue]

How is that for nice planning: Gay marriage becomes legal on June 16th, the day after the SF Opera premiered Ariodante for the first time ever. Check this out: Ginevra and Ariodante love each other, will get married. But Ginvevra is also courted by Polinesso, who in turn is the object of Ginevra's attendant Dalinda's unrequited attention. And all these roles are sung by women. How appropriate.... [continue]

Tonight, the SF Symphony presents the one thing we're most looking forward to this season: the West Coast premiere of Seht die Sonne by Finnish composer Magnus Lindberg. Co-commissioned by the symphony and the Berlin philharmonic (which created the world premiere with Sir Simon Rattle last year), this evening's program, repeated through Saturday, also includes Beethoven's 7th Symphony and Debussy Chansons de jeunesse sung by soprano Anu Komsi and conducted by Sakari Oramo. They're all... [continue]

A huge creamy moon hovers over most of the sets of Lucia di Lammermoor, a production designed by Graham Vick, which had it's premiere last night at the SF Opera; it's a big round placid disk, which moves slowly above the singers. It appears at the entrance of Lucia, on a barren plain with low purple-ish bushes and a single, wind-bent tree which makes a silouhette trying to reach for the moon. Oooh, symbolism! At this point, we know the moon will be back for The Mad Scene, the high point of Lucia. See? The full moon as the cause for temporary insanity, you know, dogs howling at the moon, girls getting cranky. The world lunatic derives from luna, moon in latin. We were warned that it's a common trope amongst Lucia set designers. What we did not expect: that we'd find a full moon again over the roofs of San Francisco, as we were going home on Valencia street. We're pretty sure it winked at us. ... [continue]

Wagner's Ring, which opened its new and awaited SF Opera production last week with das Rheingold, made the Gods human. Francesca Zambello went one step further, and made them American. Zambello has decided to stage Wagner's tetralogy, which will unfold over the next few seasons, as an American Ring. ... [continue]

In our inbox, we found all these convincing reasons to attend the performance of Beethoven's 9th symphony of the Symphony Parnassus tomorrow night: Our conductor and Music Director is Stephen Paulson, who by day is the San Francisco Symphony's principal bassoonist; Anyway, Symphony Parnassus rocks, we're a well-kept secret in the local performing arts community, and our goal is to let the secret out. Plus, you haven't lived until you've experienced the B9 live.... [continue]

It feels like everyone here migrated from the Midwest or somewhere. But next time we run into that rare breed, the born-and-raised San Franciscan, we'll have to ask: did you, as a kid, attend Adventures in Music, aka. AIM, the outreach program from the San Francisco Symphony? AIM organizes (and pays for) performances by smaller ensembles in each of the schools of the SFUSD for 1st to 4th graders, and invite them all to special morning concerts at Davies Symphony Hall. Did the introduction leave you with a taste for music? Were you looking forward for these performances by diverse small ensembles playing for small-ish goups of kids coming to your school? Was it the high point of the week? Did you discover new sounds, new instruments, new music styles? Did you teacher tie up the program into the curriculum? Were you able to comprehend music differently, to see connections with physics, geography, architecture? The eduction program is blowing twenty candles this year, so a slew of kids who went through it (22,000 a year!) must be now SFist commenters. Teachers, feel free to give us your view too! We got questions, you got answers. Tell us how going to Davies Symphony Hall as a first grader was awesome, or exciting, or, goodness forbid, boring. Was it your first classical music experience? Your first time in a concert hall? Was your conductor at the time "kinda hot" (in the words of one of our commenters) like Benjamin Shwartz, who leads the orchestra for the AIM concerts nowadays? Did you notice kinda hot boys back then? Little perv, you were seven!... [continue]

Each year, the Symphony organizes a summer festival dedicated to a theme or a composer. Next year sounds pretty intriguing: Schubert/Berg, two Viennese schools, two different styles to contrast and highlight each other. We're looking forward to it. This year, not so much: the festival was dedicated to Brahms, and we were like, blah. Programming Brahms is as exciting as a dinner of mac'n'cheese: the League of American Orchestras computed the most performed pieces of the 2006-07 season, and Brahms pieces rank 1st, 4th, 6th and 8th. We feel, why set up a special extra Brahms session when you can't swing a bow without hitting one of his symphonies. It's not like we're Brahms-deprived and need an extra dose. And yet, we went, twice, and had a great time. ... [continue]

Despite the Petit Prince's warning that anything essential is invisible to the eye, the SF Opera production of the namesake opera by Rachel Portman is all eye candy. Pastel costumes inspired by Le Petit Prince's author, continue]

Leif-Ove Andsnes should just stop traveling and move here. Looking back only a few years, we see a 2004 performance here with Ian Bostridge, a 2005 concert of a Rachmaninoff piano concerto with MTT/SFS, a solo recital in 2006. He'll be here on Sunday for a recital at Davies and again for the Brahms piano concerto No. 2 next month. Admit it, L.O., you like us, you can't live without us. In fact, we forced... [continue]

Anne-Sophie Mutter is classical music's attempt to attract the 18-34 male demographics. She's the symphony hall's answer to Monday Night Football. She can play the violin like anyone else, but she also happens to be seriously attractive. She'll play at Davies Symphony Hall on Monday 4/7 (a recital of Brahms sonatas with pianist Lambert Orkis), and we'll make the same recommendation as for the ballet: guys, take your girlfriend there, she'll think you're sensitive, cultivated, oh so sophisticated, and you'll have some eye candy to look at, you'll have a good time. You might even end up enjoying the music. ... [continue]

Two operatic legends will take the stage at Herbst theater on Thursday, to honor French mezzo-soprano and composer, Pauline Viardot. We hadn't heard of Viardot, and yet, it turns out that everyone who was anyone in Paris at the end of the 19th century (a list which includes Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, Alfred de Musset, Hector Berlioz, Camille Saint-Saens, Charles Gounod, Giacomo Meyerbeer...) was head over heels for her. Most were only infatuated with her, but Ivan Turgenev ended up moving with her and her husband, adding a Russian twist to the menage à trois. ... [continue]

Benjamin Shwartz will conduct the SF Youth Symphony on Sunday at Davies Symphony hall, in a program by Prokofiev, Bartok and Haydn. The orchestra musicians range from 12 to 20yo, and none of them was old enough to attend Benjamin's previous venture: Mercury Soul, a blend of classical music by 20th and 21st century composers with techno beats, performed, of all places, in a club, Mezzanine. ... [continue]

We admit having never seen that word before: sackbut. It sounds full of promise, definitely. Turns out it's a medieval trombone, and it will be heard this coming weekend at a few choice concerts. ... [continue]

West Side Story turned 50 last year, and Leonard Bernstein would have turned 90 next August. Classical music is giving Hallmark a run for its money as an anniversary-driven industry. The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, an orchestra near and dear to Bernstein's heart for over 40 years, will play a tribute to him this Saturday, 2/9, at the SF Conservatory of Music (8 p.m., 50 Oak Street), which will include SFCM alumni conductor and Bernstein protegé,... [continue]

The fire department cordoned off Valencia between 22nd and 23rd to put out a fire. Bikes could still go through. Gawkers were in luck: they could have some of the best coffee in SF right across the street at Ritual Roasters while watching the SFFD get at it. ... [continue]

You want to be in a Brooks Brothers riot? Just dress sharp, and be tomorrow at 8:15am at the east entrance of City Hall! The SF TIC coalition is sponsoring a gathering to celebrate the Condo Conversion lottery, which will take place inside at 9am. You'll get free Peet's coffee, and you'll hear the plight off these poor TIC owners who can't convert there place into a condo, and how it's a heavy cross to bear, and how everyone hates Chris Daly.... [continue]

One of the most effervescent, most joyously infectious things we heard last year, was Ian Bostridge and Kate Royal in a duet from Handel's Acis and Galatea, Happy We (excerpt here). We streamed it on-line from the BBC-Proms coverage, and it made us so fuzzy inside, that if it were legal, we totally would have installed a streaming audio capture software to make a copy on our computer (that and, oh say, John Adams' Dr... [continue]