Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Madama Butterfly at SF Opera Tonight the Makropulos Case opens its run at the SF Opera, as if the scheduling gods wanted to contrast this rare, exciting, must-see opera headlined by superstar Karita Mattila, with the yet-another-Madama Butterly
Arts & Entertainment SF Reviews: Philip Glass's American Seasons Philip Glass tackled the challenge of re-inventing Antonio Vivaldi's Four Seasons in an American way with his violin concerto No. 2, "American seasons," presented last night at Herbst Theater by SF Performances with
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Alice Sara Ott & Pablo Heras-Casado at the SF Symphony It's a rare bird -and a reminder of how good our local symphony can be- who can take widely different orchestral pieces, and deliver them all with crisp perfection. Pablo Heras-Casado, a thirty-three
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Cyrano at SF Opera With a relatively obscure opera and the biggest opera star on the planet, no one really cares about appreciating Cyrano. It's all about assessing Placido Domingo's performance. Does he still have it? Can
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Dresden Staatskapelle at Davies Symphony Hall If the greatness of an orchestra is measured by its commission program, the Dresdner Staatskapelle is hitting it out of the park. It plays so well that composers such as Vivaldi, Schumann, Liszt
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Joshua Bell at the SF Symphony Joshua Bell must have in his attic a painting of himself looking old and playing out of tune. We were convinced the picture on his website were all softly lenses and careful airbrush.
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Pianist Jeremy Denk It's the bane of Jeremy Denk's existence that his terrific credentials as a pianist are most often accompanied by references to his blog. Google lists 63,000 pages under his name, of which
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Pianist Kirill Gerstein Kirill Gerstein has been playing the piano with such fervor and talent that he received the Nobel prize equivalent for pianists, the Gilmore prize with a purse of $300,000. Unlike the Nobel
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Baritone Quinn Kelsey If Harry Potter was an opera, baritone Quinn Kelsey would be Hagrid: a mountain of a man, undeniably very strong, yet gentle, approachable, with a genial bonhomie. While he'll have to wait for
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Varèse, Villa-Lobos and Beethoven There's MTT the evangelist, advocating for rarely heard works and composers. And there's MTT the maestro, conducting old chestnuts with fresh vigor. Both were in full display last night, with a first half
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Violist Geraldine Walther This is a rich week-end in classical music events, with the Magnificat Baroque opening its season with a celebration of love, and one of the most respected string quartets, the Takács Quartet visiting
Arts & Entertainment Philharmonia Baroque Kicks Off 30th Season It's quite shocking that, on an all-Mozart program, there could be not one, but two works never before performed in the US. Yet that's the gift that the Philharmonia Baroque orchestra unveiled for
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Copland's Organ Symphony We attend Davies Symphony Hall for the visceral experience of a full orchestra performing: You hear it, but you feel it too, it resonates within you, it echoes off the walls and reverberates.
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Soprano Danielle De Niese Soprano sex kitten Danielle de Niese had her first San Francisco Opera performance last night as a sexy, perky Susanna in Mozart's Marriage of Figaro. She has been described as having a dancer's
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Aida at the SF Opera If no one else has stolen this lede for Aida, we will: Costumes Almost As Loud as Singers. British fashion designer Zandra Rhodes [link to her page, but as we write this, hacked
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Werther at the SF Opera Werther, sung by tenor Ramon Vargas, is in love with Charlotte (Alice Coote). Charlotte has pledged to marry Albert (Brian Mulligan), so she sends Werther away. Werther complies, but then, in a steamy
Arts & Entertainment At Last, Our Review of the SF Symphony Opening Night Gala Happy birthday, Jessye Norman, she turned sixty five yesterday. Last week, she showed no intent of cashing in the 401(k) at the Opening Night Gala of the SF Symphony, singing Copland's In
Arts & Entertainment Merola Program Grand Finale this Saturday How do you sing your goodbyes? So long, farewell, Auf wiedersehen, of course. Not the artists in the Merola program, they'll stick to what they know best: arias by Mozart, Strauss, Donizetti. They'll
Arts & Entertainment Free Opera Concert at Yerba Buena Gardens, Sunday The kids are alright. Every summer, about twenty under-thirty singers get selected after an arduous audition process to participate in the Merola opera program, a ten-week training camp with singing, diction and acting
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews: SF Symphony Assistant Conductor Donato Cabrera Donato Cabrera is currently the Assistant conductor of the SF Symphony, and the music director of the SF Symphony Youth orchestra. But this month, his main job will be to conduct a good
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Tenor Salvatore Licitra Italian tenor Salvatore Licitra just made his San Francisco debut, and his role debut, as Dick Johnson (giggle) in La Fanciulla del West with the SF Opera. It's an A-list cast, with Deborah
Arts & Entertainment SFist Interviews Pianist Extraordinaire Yuja Wang Yuja Wang became an overnight sensation when piano legend Martha Argerich cancelled a performance with the Boston symphony and Yuja stepped in and was so electrifying she brilliantly saved the evening. The next
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: die Walküre at the SF Opera If the fat lady with a Viking helmet became a symbol for opera, it's both a compliment and a condemnation of Richard Wagner. His staging of the Norse mythology has been influential and
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Faust at the SF Opera It was Opening Night at the Opera on Saturday, for the short summer stretch of the season; Gounod's Faust is an over-roasted chestnut, on the top ten most performed list at most major
Arts & Entertainment SFist Reviews: Erin Wall and the SF Symphony Robin Holloway wrote his opera, Clarissa, in 1976; it wasn't premiered until 1990, for a performance run in London that MTT attended. MTT was so excited by the music, he asked for an
