Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Le Martyre de Saint Sebastien The Martyre de Saint Sebastien, a play by Gabriele D'Annunzio with music by Claude Debussy, was, according to its original producer, "bad." Says the program notes of the SF Symphony. The run which
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interview: Violinist Christian Tetzlaff At the San Francisco Symphony it's new year, new stuff. The 1992 Ligeti violin concerto will be heard live in San Francisco for the first time ever tomorrow through Sunday. You may recall
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Carmen for Families (And Other Kids Performances) We salute the idea of introducing kids to opera with Carmen for Families: they smoke, they love, they party hard, she's promiscuous, and then he kills her. The beloved SF Opera abridged and
Arts & Entertainment SFist Wraps up the 2011 Opera Season The Fall musical season is giving way to they All-Handel-Messiah-all-the-time holiday season with a few Nutcrackers tossed in for good measure, so let's wrap up what happened at the Opera for 2011. Last
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Le Cirque du Soleil's Totem It's got a lot of singing, funky costumes and a dramatic set, all staged by the sure hand of Robert Lepage. No, it's not the Metropolitan Opera production of the Ring Cycle, it's
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: SFS Concertmaster Sasha Barantschik The 100th anniversary of the SF Symphony is such a big deal, it's sucking the air out of some other impressive milestones. One of these: Alexander Barantschik's tenth year as concert master of
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: Baritone Lucas Meachem Baritone Lucas Meachem stars as Don Giovanni in the Mozart opera currently on stage at the SF Opera (three shows left). Every year we see singers go through the ranks of the Merola
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: Mezzo-Soprano Vivica Genaux Mezzo-soprano Vivica Genaux will headline a series of concerts with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra led by Maestro Nicholas McGegan starting tonight in Atherton, tomorrow in San Francisco, and Saturday and Sunday in Berkeley.
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Phil The Dude was in town for two concerts, Sunday and Monday night. The Dude, aka Gustavo Dudamel, brought his LA Phil orchestra up north, to start the series of concerts from the other
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Verdi's Requiem at the SF Symphony James Conlon conducted a superb Verdi requiem with the SF Symphony five years ago, so we were not particularly surprised he delivered again last night with the same score. Technically, without the score,
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Don Giovanni at SF Opera Don Giovanni belongs to the category of operas that are insubmersible: as long as the cast is able and has a pulse, neither bad staging nor poor set can sink the show. The
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: James Conlon at the SF Symphony James Conlon, the LA Opera music director is in town for two weeks conducting the SF Symphony, the past week in the Pictures at an Exhibition and this week in the Verdi Requiem
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Polaris at SF Symphony For its 100th birthday, the SF Symphony is offering itself new works to unwrap all season long. This week: Polaris: Voyage for Orchestra by British composer Tom Adès, one of the hottest commodities
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: 'Heart of a Soldier' Composer Christopher Theofanidis The run of Heart of a Soldier just concluded, the spanking new world premiere commissioned by the SF Opera to commemorate the tenth anniversary of 9/11 (or rather, to honor the fallen)
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: 9/11-themed 'Heart Of A Soldier' At SF Opera In Heart of a Soldier, SF Opera's tribute to 9/11, two platoon leaders discuss their thoughts on the Vietnam war. One says, he does not want to learn the names and lives
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Turandot at SF Opera SF Opera music director Nicola Luisotti would not let last night's opening celebrations be the usual fashion défilé: sure, there were fancy Vuitton by Marc Jacobs dresses and plenty of bling-bling on display.
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: 'Heart Of A Soldier' Stage Director Francesca Zambello At the SF Opera tonight, the world premiere of Heart of a Soldier opens, based on the life of a 9/11 hero. It follows a much less controversial Turandot last night, as
Arts & Entertainment Happy 100th Birthday, San Francisco Symphony As the audience in the classical music hall gets grayer and grayer, the San Francisco Symphony does what it can to stay ahead. But it too gets older too, turning 100 tonight. The
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Merola Grand Finale The curtain opened Saturday night at the War Memorial Opera House on the David Hockney designed set of Turandot. Turandot? Had anyone surreptitiously advanced the SF Opera season opening night? Rather, the Merola
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Four Saints in Three Acts You can't swing a cat without hitting a Gertrude Stein happening in this city. The Summer of Stein sprouted two exhibits about the queer icon (and her family) at the Contemporary Jewish Museum
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: The Barber of Seville We love to see the future of opera in action, so we embarked onto the Noah's Ark of the Merola program's Il Barbiere of Siviglia last week-end: we saw two performances, two casts,
Arts & Entertainment SFist Wraps Up the 2010-11 Classical Music Season A few things to wrap up the 2010-11 classical music season: Walküre: the SF Opera Ring Cycle keeps on going strong, it's almost done with its third and final circling of the bases.
Arts & Entertainment SF Opera's Ring des Nibelungen Part IV: die Götterdämmerung Die Götterdämmerung concluded last night the SF Opera's first run though the Ring cycle (part I, part II, part III, two more cycle performances 6/21-26 and 6/28-7/3). We listened to
Arts & Entertainment SF Opera's Ring des Nibelungen Part III: Siegfried Three down, one to go. We caught Siegfried, the third part of Wagner's Ring tetralogy, last night at the SF Opera (part I: Rheingold; part II: Walküre). We admit we're getting to the
Arts & Entertainment SF Opera's Ring des Nibelungen Part II: die Walküre Act II of the Ring Cycle at SF Opera: last night, die Walküre. Das Rheingold was two and a half hours, just a teaser compared to the next three heavy weight operas, all
