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Day: June 25, 2017

BEETHOVEN’S LIFE, AT PIANO OR NARRATED, IS A PENINSULA SUCCESS STORY

BEETHOVEN’S LIFE, AT PIANO OR NARRATED, IS A PENINSULA SUCCESS STORY

The versatile pianist-actor Hershey Felder, who won praise for his performances as Leonard Bernstein and George Gershwin and other musical giants, has moved into deeper waters with his hugely successful account of the composer Ludwig van Beethoven, now in an extended run at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. Felder is a remarkable performer – a fine musician whose pianism elevates this bit of theater to a lofty plane as he entertains us with his impersonations of the…

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SYMPHONY COUNTDOWNS: MODERNS, NOVELTIES, GLITZ

SYMPHONY COUNTDOWNS: MODERNS, NOVELTIES, GLITZ

Stemming from a family of top vaudeville performers, symphony conductor Michael Tilson Thomas would inevitably strike his show-business colors eventually. After two decades’ serious-minded leadership of the San Francisco Symphony, he brought forth an astonishing orchestral concert of American Moderns augmented with colored lights, hot dancers, jazz ensemble, projections, spatial (but not spacey) musicians’ placement, video and singers in glitzy spangled outfits. Did your recent symphony program list both a stage director and choreographer like Michael’s, perchance? This main-stage program…

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